


der Grauirrgang

by Truth



Category: Labyrinth (1986), Weiß Kreuz
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fusion, Amnesia, Crossovers & Fandom Fusions, Fantasy, Horror, Mind Control, Mind Games, Multi, Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-07-01
Updated: 2014-07-03
Packaged: 2018-02-06 23:29:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 18
Words: 51,689
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1876596
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Truth/pseuds/Truth
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This story was originally begun many years ago, and for the 2013 Ao3 Auction, it was requested that I finish it.  I've begun the process of re-writing it and will be finishing it as soon as possible.</p><p>Originally loosely following the plot of the movie Labyrinth, with a cast of characters lifted from Weiß Kreuz, it diverges somewhat oddly and continues to slither rather astray.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. In which we meet several people who are both out of character and in the wrong story.

**Author's Note:**

  * For [odango](https://archiveofourown.org/users/odango/gifts).



What if someone had the power to walk within your dreams, to reach out and tease your wishes from the darkest recesses of your mind? What if the impulses that dance within your imagination could be brought to life? What if your fantasies all turned out to be merely facets of reality?

What then?

**

The dark stone floor was covered with a thin film of grime. Humidity caused drops of water to form here and there on the tall columns stretching upwards into the darkness that was the ceiling. The oppressive atmosphere in the circular room stifled the normally echoing sounds of activity from deeper inside the castle. Although the tall windows that decorated the walls were thrown open completely, no breath of wind entered to disturb the dead air. A lone figure slouched down in a low chair, his head thrown back and long hair nearly brushing the floor behind him.  
Aside from that chair and the odd bone or strangely shaped toy, the room was completely empty.

The young man, or what could be easily seen of him, wore knee-high black leather boots. Tucked into those boots, he wore a pair of extremely close-fitting white breeches. An expanse of chest was visible through his loosely laced white shirt and the fall of white lace from one wrist almost concealed the hand shielding his face. The cloak that covered his chair, however, was darkest grey with a lining of black.

The heavy silence was broken by a soft tenor laugh. "I like what you've done with the place. The marked absence of anything remotely goblin-shaped is a vast improvement."

The man in the chair sighed heavily and pulled himself to a more normal sitting position, his brooding abandoned for the sake of company. His mane of brightly colored hair caught the meager light as he glanced around for the source of the voice. "They're all out looking for cleaning supplies, supposedly."

"In other words, they're avoiding you until you find something to do other than throw temper tantrums." This time, the voice came from the opposite side of the room.

"Far, quit that." The young man in the chair made a face and slouched back in his chair. "Stop showing off and come out where I can see you."

"So you can throw things at me?" The voice came from directly behind him, soft and teasing.

"That too. You're giving me a headache."

There was a faint laugh and the owner of the voice stepped out of the shadows to kneel at the feet of the Goblin King. In sharp contrast to the flaming hair and white clothing of his King, the kneeling man was clad entirely in black leather, and his shaggily cut hair was a silver-white. "Your wish is my command, Schuldig."

"That's a laugh." Schuldig poked one booted foot at the man kneeling before him. "Where the hell have you been, Far? And what have you been doing?"

Farfarello raised his head, grinning. His one eye sparkled wickedly in his scarred face as he sat back on his heels. "Here and there. A little of this and a little of that."

Schuldig raised an eyebrow. "You haven't killed any more of my goblins, have you?"

The grin became feral. "Not lately. Why? Are you missing some?"

Sometimes it was easy to forget that the various inhabitants of the Labyrinth were really monsters. Schuldig reserved his powers of physical transformation for use on the children, primarily. Those other unfortunates who found themselves trapped in his Kingdom were generally allowed to keep their true forms. Occasionally, he even allowed them to keep their minds. For the most part, however, the creatures that roamed his kingdom were held under his total control.

Farfarello was an almost perfect example of the first category. Despite the scars that covered his face and exposed arms, he looked like a normal human male. Well, if you liked your men slender, scarred and wearing wicked smiles. He had been desperate when he came here, angry and murderous. He had been determined to punish the person who had stolen his sister and therefore willing to pay any price to force his tormentor to suffer.

All that was left of that long ago person was the murderer. On a whim, Schuldig had decided to keep him mostly around the castle instead of sending him out into the Labyrinth to become one of its ‘resident’ Guardians. Despite the odd goblin corpse, Farfarello made an amusing companion. His streak of sadism and total lack of respect occasionally made his company trying. Of course, his value as a source of distraction and amusement normally outweighed the disadvantages.

Schuldig was often bored, having none but the goblins for regular company. Farfarello brought entertainment to many a very dull day. After all, there were a great many goblins, but only one Farfarello.

"Sadly, no." Schuldig returned to his earlier pose, head thrown back and arm over his eyes.

"Bored again?" Farfarello remained kneeling, head cocked to one side. "Run out of subjects to torment?"

There was a moment’s silence. Schuldig kept his arm over his eyes, unwilling to meet Farfarello’s gaze and see the look of mocking, twisted knowing there.

"Not likely. I need something to do, damn it all." Schuldig sank even lower in his chair, sighing theatrically.

"What, nobody's wished you any squalling brats? I thought the goblin hordes seemed a bit thin of late."

"Ha. Ha. Nobody really believes anymore. I don't have to show up unless they believe."

Farfarello raised his one visible eyebrow. "People don't believe in you?"

There was a muffled snort of laughter. "I'm rather beside the point. They have to believe in possibility, in the fantastic - in magic."

"Lots of people believe in magic."

"Not as many as you'd think. Most of them are crazy. There are one or two interesting ones, but they're a bit out of my reach." Schuldig sat up and pulled a small crystal sphere out of thin air. "Here, let me show you."


	2. The Park and a Night Out

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Ran is in the park practicing for a school play and ends up coming home quite late.

Once upon a time....

A slender young man with red hair leaned gracefully on the stone balustrade of a bridge. Perhaps fifteen years old, he wore faded blue jeans and a dark green t-shirt. His admittedly good-looking features bore a dark scowl.

Fujimiya Ran was in a spectacularly grouchy mood.

He stared down into the water as he tapped the small, leather-bound book against the railing.

The bright summer afternoon had turned to evening while he brooded, although the sun was still quite high. The park had held a number of other people when he had arrived but during his sulk most of them had packed up and gone home. Now he was, for all intents and purposes, alone.

Straightening, he flipped the book over and glowered at the gold letters that graced the cover. "Of all the roles in the world, why this one?!"

Unsurprisingly, there was no response. The dog which had arrived some twenty minutes into Ran's brooding merely cocked its head and made an inquiring growl.

Encouraged, Ran turned to his canine audience.

"It's a marvelous story," he snapped, stalking the rest of the way across the bridge and coming to a stop just in front of the dog’s chosen resting place. "One of my favorites, in fact."

The dog sat up and grinned at him, delighted at the attention, despite the boy’s angry tone.

"I was so excited when they announced that our class would be putting on a performance of 'The Labyrinth' this year!" Ran's eyelid was twitching as his voice rose. "But, but this?!?!"

Ran was one of the best actors in the school. It was no surprise that the director himself had asked the quiet young man to try out for the main role. No, the surprise had come later. It was a wonderful role, admittedly.

Also written for a woman.

At fifteen, Ran was spectacularly good-looking. Lovely, in fact. That was the argument the director had used when Ran had exploded at his possible role.

"The best female actor we have just transferred to another school. You're the best actor, not to mention the prettiest. You're the only one I've got left who could hope to pull this off believably."

"I don't want to pull this off believably," Ran had shouted. "I'm not a girl!"

"It's this or one of the goblins," the director told him grimly. "I've already cast the other main roles."

"...."

"I thought you'd see it my way."

*****

Again, Fujimiya Ran was in a spectacularly bad mood and it's not hard to see why. Casting had been completed and the school was abuzz with the fact that the fairy tale heroine was to be played by a guy. Not that such things hadn’t been done before, but Ran had a reputation for being mistaken for a girl, and a history of not taking it well.

"- and if that's not bad enough, instead of rehearsing, I'm explaining it all to a dog!" Ran drew in a deep breath and forced himself to calm down. "It will be all right. I'm an actor. I'm a very GOOD actor. I can get through this."

Drawing himself up, he stomped back across the bridge and opened the book. Muttering to himself for a moment or two, he closed the book again and closed his eyes. When he opened them again, the transformation was startling.

Ran flew across the bridge, his steps sure, the book held loosely in one hand. He had apparently cast the dog as the other character in the scene as he came to a dancing halt just in front of the animal. His scowl had disappeared completely, and his features showed an interesting mix of haughtiness and apprehension.

"'Give me the child.'" It was a plea.

**

Farfarello looked at the boy in the crystal and then at the Goblin King. Schuldig was actually sitting up and paying attention for once, his languid sullenness a thing of the past.

"Schuldig, please tell me you're not going to go this route again. It’s predictable, it’s cliché, it’s –“

The Goblin King waved a hand dismissively. "Quiet. I want to hear this."

**

"'Through dangers untold and hardships unnumbered..." Ran's chin went up and his voice became almost arrogant. "...I have fought my way here to this castle, beyond the Goblin City to take back the child that you have stolen."

His canine audience was fervently wagging its tail, apparently oblivious to its assigned role of ‘villain’. Ran's voice was now angry and demanding as he stared haughtily back at the dog.

"'For my will is as strong as yours, and my kingdom as great....'"

He stopped, sighing. He flipped the book open and scowled down at the line in question. "I hate this part. Fairy tale or not, that’s just weak writing.” With another sigh, he drew himself up and scowled at the dog. “'You have no power over me."

There was a crack of thunder, and Ran jerked his head up. The once bright evening was suddenly overcast, and lightning flashed in the distance. As he stared, transfixed, a nearby clock began tolling the hour.

"Seven o'clock?" he demanded, outraged. "I don't believe it!" He turned and raced back toward the bridge. As he set foot upon the stone structure, the clouds opened and rain began to fall. Or rather, pour. With an indignant yelp, Ran increased his speed.

The dog watched the teenager until he disappeared into the trees, tail still wagging. Then, rising to its feet, it turned and also disappeared into the blackness.

***

"Maybe this one is not as far out of my reach as I'd thought."

Schuldig was smirking as he settled back in the low chair that passed for his throne. Farfarello knew that expression of old. The next few days would probably be highly interesting and provide a shakedown of the entire Labyrinth. However, after those few days....

Farfarello absently twirled one of his knives between his fingers as he thought about Schuldig's plan. After a moment or two, he sighed and rose to his feet. "There are better ways to fight boredom."

"It will be fun," Schuldig promised, his eyes gleaming.

"That's what you said the last time," Farfarello pointed out.

Schuldig looked up at his companion, the only creature in the Labyrinth that did not fear him, and smiled. "It was fun, wasn't it?"

Farfarello's cruel smile matched that of his King. "It was fun," he admitted. "Right until the end."

The Goblin King abruptly lost his smile.

"After you won," Farfarello continued, his own smile twitching slightly, "you threw her far into the Labyrinth and sulked for two months over how easy it had been."

Schuldig narrowed his eyes and glared. This was one of those moments where he found Farfarello particularly trying. He turned the crystal in his hands, watching the red-headed boy race home through the rain to his family.

The single yellow eye glinted wickedly as Farfarello sank back to his original position on the floor. He delighted in tormenting Schuldig. It was rare that he managed to take his King by surprise, and he savored every such incident.

Schuldig rallied, curling one lip in a magnificent sneer. "Of course it way easy.”

Farfarello continued to flip the knife back and forth between his fingers. "And the time before that -"

"This time it will be fun." Schuldig insisted. He stood, drawing his cloak around him and moving to one of the tall windows.

"Could we focus here? You're the Goblin King. You're supposed to be stealing small children to turn into goblins." The scarred man remained kneeling, following his King with one golden eye. "That boy's sister is too old to become a goblin."

"She can become one of the Labyrinth's guardians, then. It worked for the Takatori brat."

"Ah, yes." Farfarello rolled his eye. "That turned out well. Young Mamoru is so ferocious."

Schuldig turned from the window, blue eyes blazing. "You are pushing things, Far.”

The slender man brought his knife to his lips and almost reflectively ran his tongue across the blade, his gaze never leaving that of the King. "If I've heard that once, I've heard it a million times. Face it, Schuldig. You're in a rut."

The Goblin King suddenly spun in place, his cloak billowing around him and a brilliant smile crossing his face. "And that's why this is such a brilliant idea. If this goes properly, I'll be fulfilling my traditional purpose and amusing myself all at the same time."

"I give up. Go ahead. Play your silly games. I'll be here when it's all over. As usual." Farfarello rose lithely to his feet, sliding the knife away into the bandolier where he carried all of his lethal toys. He moved swiftly to the door, pausing only when he reached the threshold. "You know, most people simply take up a hobby when they're bored."

"I'm not most people," Schuldig told him, still wearing that self- satisfied smirk. He preened slightly, moving back toward his throne.

Farfarello left the room, slipping into the shadows of the stairway beyond. His final murmured words rang softly in the muggy air. "Thankfully so."


	3. Of bratty sisters and wishes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Aya ticks her elder brother off and a mysterious man makes a melodramatic appearance.

Ran splashed through the rain, his clothing and hair becoming heavy with the weight of the water that continued to sheet down around him. The book was tucked firmly beneath his shirt and he had both arms wrapped protectively around his body to keep the water from ruining his precious script.

Thunder cracked and rolled around him as he ran, and it made a strange sort of counterpoint to his footsteps; teasing his senses until it seemed as though he were being pulled along by the pulse of far away music.

Even taking the shortest possible route, he still found himself almost completely soaked by the time he reached his own backyard. "It's not fair," he told the puddles angrily, racing up the walk toward the porch.

"Ran! What are you doing out in the rain?"

He jerked his head upright, pushing his sodden bangs to one side so that he could face his mother. She stood on the porch, just out of the downpour. Concern warred with exasperation as she eyed her drenched son.

"I'm sorry," he mumbled, still clutching the book to his side.

"You’re going to catch your death, hurry now!”

Ran pushed past his mother, noting that she was already dressed for the dinner that his father was supposed to attend that evening. Another evening together lost, all for his father’s career. For some reason, the absolute unfairness of his entire life came crashing down on him as he sullenly trudged through the living room toward the stairs that would lead him to the sanctuary of his bedroom.

“Are you all right?” His mother followed him, her worry obvious. “You need to get out of those wet things. Can I get you a towel?”

“Aren’t you going to be late?” he asked, bitterly. He knew without looking at his mother had stopped following him and he could imagine the sudden hurt on her face.

“Ran….”

“I thought family was supposed to be the most important thing,” he continued, hating himself but unable to stop. “I thought that we were supposed to always be there for each other.”

“This isn’t something your father has control over,” she told him softly.

He turned to look over his shoulder, regretting his words but too angry still to take them back. “When was the last time we did something together? When was the last time we were a real family?”

“We are a family, Ran. We’ll always be a family. That is the most important thing. But in order to stay together, in order for you to be able to attend the schools that you want, your father has to make some sacrifices. We do love you, you must know that.” She stared up at her only son, her face reflecting her need to make him understand.

“I know it,” he said, “but that doesn’t make it hurt any less.”

Ran turned away from his mother and hurried up the stairs. This was not the first time they’d had this conversation, and he understood that sacrifices had to be made, but things never seemed to change. He heard his father’s voice as he passed his sister’s room, knowing that Aya was undoubtedly enjoying a bedtime story, one of their father’s specialties.

He made it to his own room, slamming the door in his wake. Gritting his teeth in frustration, he pulled his copy of 'The Labyrinth' from beneath his sodden shirt and threw it on the bed.

Jerking angrily at his dripping clothing, he pulled it off and threw it in the basket by the door. He pulled on dry clothing; jeans and a button down shirt. He didn't bother to do the shirt all the way up, bending instead to pull on dry socks and shoes.

As he dressed, he went over the lines that he had stumbled over in the park. He was just coming to the difficult part, mumbling to himself as he ran a towel over his bright hair when he heard his father's voice at the door.

"Ran? Is everything all right?"

Ran turned, throwing the towel with unnecessary force toward the laundry basket. "Everything’s fine." He already regretted upsetting his mother. The demands of his father's job were hardly her fault, or even his. He took a deep breath, knowing that his father wouldn't leave until he knew that Ran really was all right.

He managed a fairly good imitation of his normal voice as he looked at the still-closed door. "You'd better hurry. You're going to be late."

There was a slight pause before his father answered. "All right. Aya's had her dinner, and I just finished reading her a bedtime story. Finish your homework and get to bed at a decent hour, all right?"

Ran sank back onto the bed as he heard his father's footsteps moving quickly away down the stairs. On the one hand, it was flattering to know that his parents trusted him to look after his little sister. She was eight to his fifteen, and a royal handful at times. On the other hand....

“I hate being alone.” He flopped his head back onto the pillow and closed his eyes.

He heard the front door close behind his parents and resisted the urge to run to the window to wave good-bye. He felt abandoned, used. He threw an arm over his face and muttered, "After all, I've always got my acting career.”

"Ran's gonna be a girl!" There was the sudden patter of bare feet and a heavy weight thumped itself against Ran's midsection. His arms automatically curved upward to support his sister's weight as she landed on him.

"Whoof!"

Aya hugged him as hard as she could, her dark braids bouncing as she rocked back and forth. "Ran's gonna be a giiiiirl," she repeated, mockingly.

"As if the rest of this weren't bad enough," Ran groused. He scowled at his little sister, disengaging her arms so he could sit up. "Look, monster, leave me be."

Aya scooted off the bed and stuck her tongue out at her brother. "Shan't!"

"I'm in a really bad mood and it's past your bedtime. Get!"

The little girl took in the fire that was dancing in Ran's eyes and got. He flopped back on the bed, staring moodily at the ceiling. "Great. It was bad enough that half the high school is giving me grief. Next thing you know, Aya the big-mouth will have let the entire world know that I'm going to be out on stage, acting the fairy tale heroine."

Still grumbling, he flipped over and reached for the little leather-bound book.

It was gone.

He searched in the bed, under the bed and beside the bed before realizing what had actually happened to the book. "AYA!!!"

The sound of feet scampering abruptly away told him that he had guessed correctly. Springing to the door, he chased his sister down the hallway. She was giggling as she made it to the semi-safety of her own room and slammed the door in his face.

"Aya, this isn't funny!"

"Is!"

Ran clenched his teeth. "Please, Aya. I need to rehearse. Just give me the book."

"No!" More giggling followed.

"I hate you. I just want you to know that." Ran slumped tiredly against the wall.

"Don't care!"

"As if my day couldn't possibly get any worse?" Ran pushed half-heartedly at the door, but his little sister had her full weight resting against it and was undoubtedly braced carefully to keep him from opening the door. It was a favorite tactic of hers; his sweet little sister, the cold-hearted blackmailer.

"What do you want?"

"I want a bedtime story!"

Ran moaned. "You've already had a bedtime story." The lights flickered as there was a monumental crash of thunder from outside. The storm had to be directly overhead now.

"I want you to read me _this_ story." Aya's voice trembled slightly. She hated thunderstorms.

"If you want me to read you that story, you need to give it back to me. I haven't exactly got x-ray vision."

There was a slight pause. "No."

"Then how can I possibly read it to you?" Ran asked.

"You read this one all the time. You should know it by heart." Aya's voice was stubborn.

"If I tell you the story, can I have the book back?" Ran asked. He had a headache, his hair was still wet and all he wanted was to be left alone. 'Somebody save me....'

"Please?”

"Okay."

"Right. Once upon a time, there was a beautiful young girl whose stepmother always made her stay home with the baby. And the baby was a spoiled child, and he wanted everything for himself and the young girl was practically a slave." There was a flash of lightning and another crack of thunder. Ran paused look warily upward as the lights flickered again.

"Go on," Aya's voice wavered slightly.

"But what no one knew was that the King of the Goblins had fallen in love with the girl, and he had given her certain powers."

**

Farfarello was lounging in Schuldig's throne, staring intently into one of the Goblin King's small crystals. He shook his head slightly as he watched the story telling unfold.

"Schuldig, that story's so old it's got whiskers. You hate it and complain about it constantly. There's no way he's going to wish his sister on you. Not like this."

One or two goblins were lurking around the edges of the room, being careful not to draw the leather-clad creature's attention to them. They watched and listened, awe-struck, as the little scene in the crystal played itself out.

**

Ran closed his eyes, fighting away the sudden desire to just give up and go crawl into bed. "So one night, when the baby had been particularly cruel, she called on the goblins for help."

**

"Listen," hissed one.

Farfarello moved, his arm flashing so quickly that the gesture was more implied than seen. The long knife that pinned the unwary goblin to the wall by one sleeve, on the other hand, was extremely visible.

Wisely, the other goblins did not comment.

Giving them a searching look, Farfarello turned back to the crystal.

Several more goblins filtered into the throne room. When the King was planning something, it was wise to remain where he could find you if he needed you. The dangers of being disemboweled while still squirming by the King's unpredictable pet were slightly less frightening than the prospect of ticking off the Goblin King himself.

And so they crept into the chamber, staying as far away from Farfarello as possible.

**

"'Say your right words, the goblins said and we'll take the baby to the Goblin City and you will be free.'" Ran recited the line, his eyes still closed.

**

Farfarello scowled. Schuldig was tampering, he could tell. Somewhere, not terribly far from the teenager in the hallway, the Goblin King was gently teasing this little encounter in the direction that he wished it to go.

"That's cheating," he hissed. "We're all going to be in a world of hurt if you screw this up, Schuldig."

The goblins all flinched, as if expecting their King to appear and smite Farfarello on the spot. Nothing happened. Schuldig was busy concentrating on Ran, his thoughts far away from his kingdom.

**

"But the girl knew that the King of the Goblins would keep the baby in his castle for ever and ever and ever and turn it into a goblin. And so the girl suffered in silence until one night, when she was - "

Aya pressed against her side of the door, the necessity of keeping her brother shut in the hall forgotten as she listened to his voice. Ran was indeed an excellent actor, and his stories always captivated his sister.

Ran himself paused, the story taking a different turn in his head. After a moment, he gave in to the idea. " - was tired from a long day at school and she was hurt by the cruel abandonment of her parents and she could no longer stand it."

"Is that really the way the story goes?" Aya looked dubiously at the book in her hands.

"Hmmm? Oh, not really." Ran sighed, his concentration broken. "I'm too tired for this. Just give me the book, all right?"

"Won't! Finish the story."

"Just knock it off!" Ran fought back a growing headache. There was no answer from the other side of the door. He slipped back into his storyteller's voice. "'I'll say the words! No, I mustn't. I mustn't say -"

**

Several of the more excitable goblins were clinging to each other in excitement and Farfarello's eyebrows were climbing upward toward his raggedly cut hair.

"Don't tell me this one's as susceptible as Crawford was? I won't believe it."

**

"'I wish.... I wish....'"

**

The increasing volume and intensity of the goblin whispers didn't disturb Farfarello this time. He glared into the crystal.

"This is too easy."

More whispering. "He's going to say the words!"

**

"'I can bear it no longer! Goblin King, Goblin King, wherever you may be. Take this child of mine far away from me!'"

**

A stunned silence filled the throne room for a moment before the goblins resumed their whispering.

"That's not right!”

They shut up abruptly as Farfarello burst into delighted laughter. "Oh, this is rich. Picked a target a little more strong-minded than you had planned on?"

The nearest goblins backed quickly away. Farfarello was most dangerous when he was laughing.

**

There was another magnificent crack of thunder, this one shaking the house. Aya let out an undignified squeak and huddled closer to the door.

"Look, Aya. This is getting old. Just give me the book."

"No! Finish the story!"

Ran got to his feet. The headache was slowly growing and right now, all he wanted was to go to bed. "Give me my book!"

"No!" Aya jumped as her brother hit the door with one fist, but continued to clutch the book.

Ran leaned his forehead against the door. "I'm too tired for this garbage, Aya. Come on, just give me the book. The goblins are welcome to you, for all I care. I wish there were words I could just… say.”

**

Farfarello's eye widened. This was interesting. An indirect appeal wasn't enough, but it would justify further tampering on Schuldig's part. Sort of.

The goblins were getting very excited, although whether it was the promise of their King finally finding something to do other than torment them or whether they were anticipating a new playmate was hard to tell. Farfarello didn’t care enough to wonder which.

“This is _stupid_ ,” he told the tiny image in the crystal. “No one works magic this way. You’ll tie us all to the story – and a badly written one at that.”

**

Ran pushed himself away from the door and glared at it. "I wish.... I wish -"

**

It didn't matter how much noise the goblins made now. They could have had a full-scale war and the black-clad dealer of death in their midst would not have noticed. This new toy of the Goblin King's had a strong will. He had to. Otherwise he would have spouted off those infamous words about ten minutes ago.

This did not bode well.

The only other victim of Schuldig’s mind-bending who had held out half so well was Farfarello himself, and he while he enjoyed these games of Schuldig's, to a point, he did not relish the idea of company.

Or competition.

**

Turning on his heel, Ran stalked back towards his room. "I wish the goblins _would_ come and take you away," he muttered angrily. "Right now."

There was a gigantic flash of light accompanied by an enormous roll of thunder, and the lights went out. Ran stopped where he was, waiting for Aya to come bursting from her room, wailing. She always came to him during thunderstorms. She couldn't stand to face them alone.

Her door remained obstinately shut.

"Aya?" he started slowly back down the hallway. "Aya!"

Pushing gently against the door to his sister's room, he found that it opened at his touch. Stepping inside, he flicked the light switch up and down twice. Nothing happened.

"Aya? Where are you?" He moved into the room, stepping over an abandoned doll. He was starting to feel the first edge of fear. Where was his sister?

Unlike his own room, which was almost pathologically neat, his sister's bedroom was cluttered with toys and comic books. While Ran's walls were lined mostly with books, brightly colored posters hung here. Thus, when the lightning flashed again, the littered toys and jumbled posters gave a confusing impression of color and shadows.

The lights flickered for an instant, a ‘pop’ sounding somewhere in the house as they went out again, this time for good. Lightning strobed the room; thunder rattling at the windowpanes. Ran jumped a little, turning to search for the source of a faint, unnerving sound that died away as the thunder faded. Watching the shadows move as the light flashed and faded didn’t help his fear.

The sound came again, this time from the direction of his sister's bed. He moved forward slowly, his stomach twisting with tension.

Coming to a halt beside the unmade bed, he extended trembling fingers toward the tangle of blankets and tugged them away. An empty expanse of brightly colored sheets was revealed, empty. As he stared, unsure of what to do next, there was another flash of lightning and the sound became audible as laughter. Thunder rolled across the house in waves that were more felt than heard, and Ran knew without a doubt that he was in trouble.

More laughter came from the dark corners of the room, almost drowned out by the thunder. High, nails-on-the-blackboard hilarity mixed with low, gurgles of amusement. Ran took an involuntary step backward toward the window only to be halted by a muffled thumping noise. He whirled.

The huge tree outside the room was beating against his sister’s window, driven by the wind of the storm. It was backlit by the lightning and Ran again found himself backing away, this time in the opposite direction. The surreal combination of the storm with the nasty, grating laughter combined to shoot adrenaline through his system.

"Aya!” He had to shout over another roll of thunder.

The laughter continued, accompanied now by half-seen movement here and there as the shadows flickered. He was surrounded, and panic began to set in. He twisted and turned, trying to pin down the source of the laughter, but it _moved_ , liquid as the shadows. The tree continued to thump its branches against the window, seemingly demanding entrance and in a way that frightened Ran the most.

Another cataclysmic roll of thunder, and the large french windows that lead to the balcony slammed open. A swirl of wet leaves swept through the opening, and Ran ducked, hunching over and throwing up his arms to protect his face as the leaves whirled around him. The wind from the storm outside howled through the room, bringing the rain and the sharp smell of nearby lightning.

The eerie laughter died mid-cackle and Ran felt the wind began to fade. The mad fluttering of the posters and the curtains slowed slightly, despite the still-open windows.

Ran cautiously straightened, letting his arms fall to his sides, and turned slowly to face the opened windows. 'I am in deep, deep trouble.'

Posed arrogantly in the opening was a man. Ran felt his jaw drop as he stared at the apparition, seeing him for a moment illuminated by a glittering fall of lights.

The new arrival was tall, topping Ran's own height by at least six inches. He was dressed entirely in white, a long cloak streaming behind him as the last of the wind died away.

The man stepped into the room and just as the storm had calmed at his appearance, the lights flickered back to life. The dim illumination afforded by Aya's small bedside lamp was just enough to get a better look at the stranger.

His angular face bore a superior, almost gloating smile. Framing that face were long strands of orange/red hair, cut in such a fashion as to draw almost total attention to a pair of piercing blue eyes. The white clothing, consisting of high-collared jacket and tight pants, appeared to be leather as did his tall, white boots. The cloak itself seemed to retain some of the glitter and sparkle of before, giving an even more surreal edge to the proceedings. The stranger paused just inside the room and turned that odd smile on Ran.

Ran did not back away. In the back of his mind he was both pleased and amazed by this. This was theatre. This was something he _knew_. This was a story so familiar that the appearance of this man was a relief.

Almost involuntarily, he spoke. "You’re the Goblin King. I - you can’t be. It’s just a story!"

The King inclined his head slightly, that strange smile never leaving his face. He raised one eyebrow, as if encouraging Ran to continue.

Drawing his courage, Ran spoke again. "And… you’ve stolen my sister. Why?”

"It was nothing more than you asked of me." Schuldig's smile became a solemn frown as he cut Ran off. 

"But I didn't mean it," Ran protested, his voice strained. “It’s just a story and those are just lines.”

"Those lines are in that story?" The frown became an indulgent smile, combining disbelief with patronization. He held up his hand, showing the worn volume last held by Aya. “Really. I don’t remember _those_ precise words anywhere in here.”

Ran fought back his anger and fear, his voice shaking slightly. "Does it matter? You took her, and I want her back."

Schuldig examined the book, struggling not to laugh. "I think you’ll find it matters a great deal. You do remember the rest of the story, don’t you?"

'I'm trapped in some horrible nightmare.' The temporary comfort of recognizing the story, the ‘play’ he found himself in had well and truly vanished. Ran tried to pull his calm back together. "Kidnapping is, is typical of fairy tales and it never ends well. For anyone. This is… not that story. I’m not a girl, my sister is too old – I want her back. Please.”

The boy was actually begging, however hard he attempted to disguise it. Schuldig cocked a sardonic eyebrow. Perhaps this wouldn't be as much fun as he'd thought. Ah well. He stepped further into the room, his cloak flaring behind him as he moved.  
The book hit the floor by Ran’s feet with a ‘slap’ of leather. Schuldig loved the theatrics, and knew Ran recognized them for what they were. 

"Ran, you know how the story goes. You’re right. This isn’t that story. You don’t really want to do this, and we both know it. Go back to your room. Forget about your sister."

Ran could feel a pressure being brought to bear, feel everything wobble just a little, letting him see the wires and the seams in the scenery, glance down to see if there was a strip of reflective tape to mark his spot. 

For a moment, the desire to simply scoop up the discarded book by his feet and leave the room seemed almost reasonable. He focused on an image of his little sister's laughing face and resisted. "No. Whatever this is – no. If I walk out of this room without her, I’ll never see her again."

"No?" The Goblin King reached out and pulled a shimmer of light from the air. He watched the boy's face intently as he turned it, conjuring a ball of crystal into the palm of his hand. This was his favorite part.

"What - ?" Ran pulled his eyes from the glistening sphere, feeling that same pressure again, this time urging him in a different direction. He refused to give in.

"You know what it is." Schuldig's voice was almost dismissive. He had the boy – almost. He lowered his voice slightly, putting a coaxing purr into his words. "It’s a dream. If you want it badly enough, it can become your reality."

He twisted his gloved hands, letting the crystal roll down the back of one and up the other, sliding it from one side to the next. It danced and glimmered as it moved, creating a pattern of light. He smiled as he watched Ran's eyes follow its every move.  
"But to attain those dreams, you have to want them more than anything else."

Ran tried not to stare at the crystal as it danced between the hands of the Goblin King. 'My dreams?' Something in it called to him, to reach out and take it, to lose himself completely in his dreams of magic and freedom. He could almost taste the fame and fortune; see himself surrounded by his adoring family -

Schuldig could tell the exact moment that the magic failed, and he couldn’t decide if he were pleased or disappointed.

"I won’t.” The answer was ripped out of him without any conscious thought. His voice sounded harsh after the soft whisperings of the Goblin King. Ran blinked back involuntary tears as the image of his family swirled away. He swallowed and went on, the words coming in a rush. "Aya needs me.”

Schuldig's smile vanished entirely. The boy had unexpected depth, and it suddenly displeased him. "Ran."

Ran jerked, staring wide-eyed at the fantastical figure before him. The silken voice had suddenly grown sharp edges, and the Goblin King did not look at all pleased. He held up that enticing crystal globe and turned his hand. To Ran's surprise and mild horror, the crystal began to blacken, cracks spreading across the shining surface, and it crumbled into dust in the graceful, gloved hands.

Schuldig looked down at his hands for a long moment, his expression considering. His eyes met those of his latest victim for a long moment. "You’ll regret this."

Mocking laughter echoed from the various crannies and shadows throughout the room and strange voices gave whispering echoes. “Regret. Regret. You will. You do.”

Appalled and disoriented, Ran whirled around, but caught only the faintest glimpses of movement. He turned back, lifting his eyes to again meet those of his tormentor.

Cruel amusement looked back at him from those blue eyes, and Schuldig laughed. "You're can’t hope to win, Ran. You don’t even know what the game really is."

Ran gritted his teeth. "I will not leave Aya with you!"

Schuldig sighed and moved to the other side of the windows. The boy was going to be tiresome about this. But there were a variety of things that he could do. The game was only beginning. With a grandiose gesture, he flung one arm toward the open window. "You know this part. She’s been taken to the castle.”

Leaning forward to see past the melodramatically posed figure of the Goblin King, Ran gasped. Instead of the rain-drenched branches of the trees that should have stood outside his sister's balcony, there was an expanse of yellow and orange sky. He ran out onto the balcony, stopping when he realized that it was no longer truly there.

The comforting, bizarre feeling that he’d slipped into a performance, fled completely, leaving him with the beginnings of panic.

Spread out before him were what appeared to be miles of walls, twisting and turning around each other, all the paths snaking up a gigantic hill toward a faraway castle. Ran stared at the strange landscape, shocked beyond words. Somewhere in the back of his head a tiny voice was screaming at him to do something, anything!

The voice of the Goblin King interrupted his musings, soft and serious. "Do you still want to do this?"

'This is the Labyrinth. Magic is real. This could be the beginning of the most exciting adventure of my life.' All it might cost him would be his sister.

Ran turned to look back at Schuldig, noticing almost absently that his sister's room had disappeared altogether, and they were standing together on a hilltop. "Is that the castle beyond the Goblin City?

"You can still accept the dream. You can still walk away." Schuldig looked down at Ran, smiling. This was his last chance to get away safely. After this point, no one had ever escaped the Labyrinth.

Ran drew in a deep breath, forcing himself to regain some of his more normal calm. He knew how the story went. The story he knew now was, at best, _slightly_ true. If he beat the Labyrinth, he would get his sister back. If he failed? Best not to dwell on that. "I c – I won't."

Schuldig's smile could only be described as predatory. "That’s what I thought.”

Turning away from the smirking Goblin King, Ran looked over the Labyrinth again. "It doesn’t look like the picture."

The Goblin King was suddenly directly behind him, making him jump slightly. "I guess the artist never got this far." Schuldig continued moving until he was past Ran, and then whirled to face him, his cloak again flaring in his wake. “Very traditionally, you have thirteen hours in which to solve the Labyrinth before your little sister will belong to me forever. You’ve got a watch, so I presume you can keep track of the time?"

Ran stared, horrified, as the Goblin King and the clock faded from view. Schuldig's voice floated back to him on the slight breeze.

"So much for dreams."

**

When Schuldig appeared in the doorway of his throne room, Farfarello had made himself comfortable in the Goblin King’s vacant throne. He was staring with evident disgust at the small girl sitting on the floor. The goblins, still hovering at the very edges of the chamber, were watching with something akin to horrified fascination.

"You don't frighten me at all!" she told Farfarello, sticking her tongue out at him.

The goblins made various noises indicative of shock and alarm as Farfarello ground his teeth together, glaring horribly at the little girl.

"Hello, Far, Aya. I see you've become acquainted?" Schuldig made his way across the room, pretending not to hear the numerous sighs of relief that greeted his appearance.

"I don't like it here," Aya told him fiercely.

Schuldig was somewhat of an expert on children of all ages. The knowledge had been gained mostly involuntarily, but he knew how to handle them. Aya wasn't going to let anyone intimidate her, no matter how afraid she was and she would not cooperate with him unless he treated her like an adult.

In another overly dramatic swirl of cloak, he sank to his heels beside her. "It's just for a little while, sweetheart."

"You’re creepy. And a kidnapper. So you’re lying." She was biting the inside of her cheek to keep her scowl in place, and they both knew it. “And there are disgusting things in the darkness and it _smells_.”

"They're just goblins," Schuldig smiled at her. "They won't hurt you."

"You're the Goblin King, aren't you?" Aya fixed him with her large blue eyes, unconsciously echoing her brother's words.

"I am."

"Are you the hero, or the villain?"

Farfarello burst out laughing. "He's the villain, little girl. Don't let him convince you otherwise."

Aya, however, knew an easy mark when she saw it. Stepping forward to lean against Schuldig, she turned and pointed an accusing finger at Farfarello. "I don't like him. He's rude."

"Yes, but he's got his good points as well," Schuldig told her, hiding a smile. "Now, I have some things to take care of. Why don't you just keep an eye on her for me, would you, Far?"

Farfarello pulled himself up out of the Goblin King's throne and turned a dark glare on said King. "You want me to baby-sit? Are you mad?"

The glare was almost matched by the one Aya turned on him. "I don't want to stay with him. I want to go home."

Schuldig pulled gently on one of Aya's braids. "Your brother is on his way here to pick you up," he told her. "You can go home when he gets here."

"If he gets here," but Farfarello's angry muttering was lost as the goblins began clamoring for the attention of their King.

Aya glanced from Farfarello to Schuldig. She knew a lie when she heard it


	4. Enter the ne'er do well

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And here's someone new. Hung over, no less.

Kudou Yohji found himself drifting towards consciousness. He hated that. In fact, he spent most of his time attempting to avoid that fate. Consciousness meant wakefulness, and wakefulness implied coherent thought. He tried to avoid thinking at all costs.

At this exact moment, he was curled up under a tree somewhere in the Labyrinth's forest. Judging by the muffled squawks from what passed for bird life here in Schuldig's domain, it was just past sunrise; far, far too early to have to face the world.

So why was he waking? Muzzily, he registered a presence. Someone was leaning over him. This far in the forest it would have to be one of the other Labyrinth Guardians, and thus not a true danger to him - Farfarello's obsession with blood aside. He dug in his metaphorical heels and clung to his precious state of almost-sleep.

"Where does he find the stuff?" The voice was low and exasperated, also familiar. Crawford – of course.

"Distills it himself, I'd imagine." This voice was amused and even more easily identifiable as Schuldig, the Goblin King.

Having recognized the voices, Yohji was more determined than ever not to allow himself to be woken. Of late, Schuldig only bothered with Yohji when he had a job too menial for Crawford and too boring for Farfarello.

On the other hand, to have them together standing over him? The Goblin King almost never associated directly with Crawford, orders being given and taken through Farfarello. What could possibly have brought them to his side at the same time? 

Cursing his curiosity, Yohji blearily opened his eyes.

"Awake, are we?" Crawford straightened his glasses and gave the recumbent man an irritated look.

"Where the hell did you find a suit?" Yohji croaked, attempting to shield his eyes from the sun's piercing rays.

Crawford didn’t stoop to a retort, instead straightening his tie.

Schuldig leaned against a nearby tree, laughing silently. Crawford possessed a strong sense of what was 'correct', one he managed to maintain even surrounded by ruins and monsters. Yohji, with his ever-present sunglasses, earring and cigarettes most definitely did not qualify. 

Yohji fumbled around until he found his sunglasses and slipped them on, ignoring Crawford’s censoring stare. “You look ridiculous.”

"At least I don't wake each morning having passed out under a random tree," Crawford said. "Get up."

"Why?"

"Because I need you," Schuldig responded lazily. "We have a visitor, and I want you to greet him."

"Why me?" Yohji pulled himself upright, wincing a little at the pain in his head.

"Because you wished yourself here, making you one of my subjects," Schuldig said. "My every wish is your command, remember?"

Crawford raised an eyebrow. "Wished _himself_?"

"It's rare," Schuldig smirked, ignoring the icy glare that Yohji was sending him. "However, it does occasionally happen. He's an odd one even among them. Most of the ones who arrive here as a result of their own wish are either catatonic with guilt or end up killing themselves."

"And how did _you_ get here, asshole?" Yohji snapped, sending Crawford an equally nasty look.

"None of your business," Crawford responded calmly.

"Crawford ran afoul of his employers, can you imagine that? Due to his rather interesting talents, they resorted to magic instead of simply giving him his pink slip. And in this day and age, too." The Goblin King examined his nails theatrically while Crawford stiffened slightly.

"I guess I can see that," Yohji fished out a cigarette from somewhere in his low-slung jeans and lit it, wincing at the temporary brightness of the flame. "I mean, I can't imagine the cold bastard trying to fight his way through the Labyrinth for anyone. Especially in a suit."

Crawford merely raised an eyebrow at the younger man. "Again, none of your business.”

Schuldig was laughing again as he waved one hand at Yohji. "Just make sure he gets to the right place on time, Crawford. Fill him in on what’s required. Then you get to your own post. I'll send Farfarello to check on you both, later."

The two men were left staring as the Goblin King disappeared.

"He needs a hobby. One that isn’t _us_.””

"No kidding," Yohji drawled, recovering somewhat from the pounding in his head.

Crawford pulled himself together and shot an unfriendly glare at the younger man. "Just get a move on. We haven't got much time."

**

Ran stared with disbelief at the space once occupied by the alarming Goblin King. After a moment or two, he turned to look out over the miles of Labyrinth stretching across his field of view.

"The Labyrinth," he murmured. “Magic and tricks and someone who cheats. I don’t know this story.” Ran drew in a deep breath and squared his shoulders. “But I will.” He started down the hill toward the giant wall that encircled the maze. The walk would take him almost a half-hour, judging by the scale of the enormous Labyrinth.

It was closer to an hour before he neared the huge walls. The Labyrinth was indeed a work of art, and as he reached the end of the faint path, he could see vines and shrubs planted along the walls. There was movement here and there, but nothing obvious. Birds perhaps. There was a small, tiled pool to one side and....

There was a man lying on his back, one hand trailing idly through the dark green waters of the pool. He was dressed entirely in black; low-riding jeans and a cropped-top. His shoulder-length hair spilled around him, and he had sunglasses perched on his nose and a cigarette in his other hand. He appeared to be muttering to himself.

"Fucking know it all. 'Go here and do this. Go there and do that.' Who does he think he is? Hell, Mamoru has been here longer than _he_ has."

Ran came to a somewhat scandalized halt a few feet from the man. He was quite a bit younger than this strange person, perhaps ten years or so. He paused, unsure of what to do. In a setting as fantastic as the Labyrinth this, this person seemed just a little out of place.

"I don't know why the hell _I_ have to be the one to do this -"

"Um, excuse me?" Ran interrupted.

"Argh!" The young man jumped, dropped his cigarette and almost tipped himself into the pool. "Who -?” He pulled himself upright and stared over the top of his sunglasses at the person who had interrupted him.

'Young. Fifteen, sixteen? That was about right. Red hair, purple eyes.... Showy little bugger. This must be the one. Why me?' Yohji stared for a moment before settling on a reaction. "Oh." The tone dripped disdain. "This’ll be _fun_."

Determined to get off on the right foot, Ran ignored the cryptic comment and tried again. "I need to get through the Labyrinth. To the castle?"

The other man ignored him, his attention caught by rustling in some nearby bushes. He pulled a pair of gloves from his belt and slipped them on. Ran looked in that direction as the tall stranger slipped with cat-like grace toward the disturbance. As the Ran watched, warily, three young men wearing strange masks popped out  
of the shrubbery. They were laughing, cackling actually.

There was a sudden quick movement from his new acquaintance, and the nearest man sank to his knees, a gout of dark blood erupting from his throat. Ran stared, appalled, as the other two men were swiftly put down equally swiftly. The stranger from the pool dispatched them quickly and efficiently, his weapon apparently a shining spool of wire that he wore on his wrist.

Yohji finished dispatching the pests and looked up to see Schuldig's latest diversion backing away from him, an appalled look on his green-tinged face.

"You, you killed them,” he breathed. "That was murder!"

Yohji simply watched him back away, an amused expression on his face. Ran continued to retreat until he bumped into something. He turned, or attempted to, only to find himself trapped by an arm around his mid-section, and a shining blade pressed against his throat.

Yohji let out a slightly exasperated sigh and flicked his wrist, wrapping the sharp wire around the haft of the blade and tugging sharply away from Ran's attacker; effectively preventing the blade from cutting the boy's throat. With a second swift movement, he kicked Ran out of the encircling arm. 

The garroting that followed was efficient and gruesome.

Flat on his the ground, Ran watched with new horror as the man died, his face purple and eyes bugged out. Shock held him still and trying hard not to lose control of his stomach. “Tha- that… how could you?”

The stranger re-wrapped his wire. "These are intruders," he told Ran disgustedly. "They are drawn here by the Labyrinth's magic, but don't know how to get in. While it's dangerous inside, it's worse out here. Don't you know anything about the Underground?"

"I thought it was a labyrinth. A maze of magic, like in fairy tales!" Ran was regaining his equilibrium quickly, but he was careful not to look at any of the carelessly splayed bodies as he wrestled with control of his stomach.

"Not exactly," Yohji laughed bitterly. His hang-over hadn't improved much, and the rapid movements and exertion had combined to make his head feel as though it were splitting directly down the middle.

"You're a monster," Ran repeated firmly.

"Sure, whatever. I'm the monster. And who the hell are you?" Yohji bent to examine one of the bodies, not really paying much attention to the teenager behind him. The Goblin King would want to know about these clowns.

"My name is Fujimiya Ran – and,” regaining his equilibrium somewhat, or at least managing to get his stomach under control, he asked again, “Do you know how to get to the castle?”

Yohji turned to give him a sneering once over. "Ran, huh? Otherwise known as Schuldig’s latest toy."

Ran couldn't decide whether to be offended or not, but Yohji had moved on to the next body. With a sigh, he trailed after the other man. "Then do you know where the door to the Labyrinth is?"

"Maybe." Yohji scowled at the corpse. These yahoos were complete amateurs. Even they had somehow managed to get inside the Labyrinth, they wouldn't have lasted ten minutes. It had been a waste of his time to cut them down. Oh well, Schuldig would have been pissed if he'd let the kid get killed.

"Maybe?" Ran waited, but clarification did not seem to be forthcoming.

'Crawford should have seen these guys coming and warned me, damn it.' Yohji promised himself a reckoning with the other man sometime in the near future. 'This stupid assignment is bad enough, waiting for some brat to -'

"What did you mean ‘maybe’?" Ran was losing his ability to be calm, or maybe that was just the shock finally beginning to fade.

Yohji blinked and looked up, his attention brought back to the here and now. "Maybe?"

"The way into the labyrinth."

"I’m sorry?" Yohji smirked, determined to take out his ill-temper on this aggravating child.

Ran waved his arms. "You’re just wasting my time!"

"The feeling is completely mutual." Yohji assured him sweetly. He abandoned the corpses and wandered over to lean against the massive outer wall of the Labyrinth. 'It's a damn good thing Schuldig didn't send Farfarello. The kid would be bleeding decoratively all over the landscape by now.'

"How do I get into the Labyrinth?" Ran grit his teeth and stared studiously at Yohji and not at what the man was doing.

"Ah." Yohji grinned triumphantly. “You want the door. It’s right there." He gestured for Ran to turn around.

Ran pivoted, glancing suspiciously over his shoulder. A space of wall which he would have sworn had been blank just a moment before now sported a gigantic pair of wooden gates. Spanned by iron bands and sporting huge rings, they creaked open as he stared disbelievingly at them.

Yohji nearly laughed at the expression, but found himself sobering. The Labyrinth was a nasty place. There were ten guardians to maneuver around, and that wasn't even counting the more run-of-the-mill hazards of the place. Chances of this kid making it through in one piece were fairly good. Schuldig didn't like it if one of his challengers got killed on their run for the castle, and what the Goblin King ‘didn’t like’ tended to cause horrible fallout. But there was nothing preventing one of the Guardians from maiming Ran, if they really felt like it. 

He looked over his sunglasses at the boy and allowed a tinge of concern to show  
in his voice. "Do you have any idea what you’re doing?"

Ran shook his head, not even looking back at Yohji. “No.”

The redhead stepped through the doors and looked around. He found himself in a corridor, walls stretching away to the left and right as far as he could see. The bricks which made up the wall were dark, and glistened with moisture. Here and there, greenery sprang from small cracks between the rectangular stones.

"Nice atmosphere, if you like despair."

Ran jumped as Yohji's voice sounded only inches from his ear. He spun to face the taller man, but Yohji had already moved away and was staring pensively at the wall.

"Now, would you go left or right?" Yohji tilted his head and looked back over his shoulder at the teenager. This was a trick question, and he had a feeling that it would pass right over this Ran’s head.

"Is there any real difference at this point?”

Yohji sighed and dragged one hand through his hair. “As they’re _opposite_ directions, I’d imagine so.”

"Which way would you go?" Ran glanced warily back at Yohji.

"Me?" The Guardian pulled out his cigarettes and lit himself another one. "If I were you, I wouldn’t set foot in the damn place.”

Ran scowled. "That’s not exactly helpful."

Yohji took a deep drag on his cigarette and blew a smoke ring at him. "You aren’t going to make it, kid. I can tell you that right now. Even if you catch up with Schuldig, you’ll never make it back out. No one does."

"Thanks for the encouragement." Ran squared his shoulders and tried not to admit to the feeling of impending doom.

"At least I know what I’m talking about!" Yohji's hang-over chose that moment to again make itself known, and he had no patience to spare.

"Thanks for nothing.”

Yohji glared at Ran's back as the teenager wandered past him, heading down the corridor to the right. "If you do make it, I’d about believe that you two deserve each other.”

The lanky man threw his cigarette to the ground and stomped back out the large doors, making an impatient gesture behind him. Obedient to their Guardian's will, they closed with an impressive slam.

Ran jumped at echoing clang as the doors sealed themselves. With a rueful shrug, he looked again to the right and to the left. The passageway to the left was fairly clear, stretching away into the distance bare of debris. The right hand direction, on the other hand, was littered with fallen branches.

With a sigh, Ran turned toward the right. As he started down the long hallway, one of the plants turned to look after him. The many eyes that grew on its stalks blinked and watched as he strode away. Ran, busy with thoughts of rescuing his little sister, failed to notice.

He walked for several minutes, picking his way carefully among the branches and leaves that littered his path. It was quiet here, almost dead silent. There seemed to be a fog or mist in the distance, far down the corridor and even his own footsteps seemed muffled. It was sort of eerie.

It rapidly went from eerie to boring. Nothing happened. Nothing continued to happen for quite some time. He continued to walk, stepping over the occasional large branch and pushing smaller twigs out of the way with his foot. The walls continued to extend onward into the distance. The fog continued to hang about a very long way off. The silence was beginning to get to him.

He finally came to a halt in the center of the corridor, pausing to look back over his shoulder. It looked exactly the same as it had the last three times he had done so. With a low growl he spun to lean his shoulders against the wall.

"This doesn’t make any sense.” Ran was starting to get tired. He was also becoming aware of a faint rumbling in his stomach. He had missed dinner while brooding in the park. Why didn't the various fairy tales and legends ever mention these things?

Well, other than not to eat anything offered by passing strangers, and to share your sandwiches with anyone who asked for them. Aya had a huge library of fairy tales, and Ran had contributed to it with his own books more than once. He’d read them all and even if this wasn’t the story he’d thought it was, there had to be some grain of truth in there somewhere.

Ran straightened and pushed away from the wall. He was the hero, here. Technically. He was the one pursuing truth and justice. The Labyrinth would not defeat him, as long as he didn’t give up.

He thought again of the twists and turns he had seen from his vantage point on the hill. He took one last look over his shoulder and then turned back in his chosen direction. After a few steps, he was running. Vaulting branches and small logs, he sped forward.

**

Schuldig had managed to find Aya a deck of cards from somewhere or other. She was currently seated on the floor of his throne room, attempting to teach some of the smarter goblins to play Go Fish. She was having a difficult time of it.

The Goblin King's attention, however, was on Farfarello. The white-haired man was perched in one of the windows, gazing moodily out over the Labyrinth.

"You're angry," Schuldig observed casually, leaning back in the low-slung chair that served as his throne.

"What if I am?" Farfarello continued to stare. He could see almost half the Labyrinth from this vantage point, and all of the Goblin City.

"Why? We've played this game often enough before."

"Something's not right," Farfarello told him. "And the boy is too strong."

The amused voice of the Goblin King sounded in his ear as a pair of arms draped over his shoulders. "Are you suggesting that this child may be too much for me?"

The younger man shrugged Schuldig off, finally turning to face him. "I'm saying that he has a strong will. Are you sure that you'll be able to manipulate him? Sure enough to bet your kingdom on it?"

Schuldig drew back a little, raising an eyebrow. "My, aren't we gloomy today."

"You just can't be reasoned with in this mood." Farfarello slid from the window and moved to stand behind Aya. "I don't like this."

"You're worrying over nothing." Schuldig returned to his throne, throwing himself down on it .

"Am I?" Farfarello cocked his head to one side. "We'll see."

"Far, I...." Flame-colored hair flicked to the left and right as Schuldig swiftly scanned the room. His pet sadist had disappeared again. The Goblin King sank back into his seat, a frown creeping across his features. It was hard to upset Farfarello, harder still to actually unsettle him.

The Goblin King cast a thoughtful glance at the little girl at his feet, who was currently engaged in trying to keep the goblin to her right from eating the cards.

"I wonder."


	5. Taking Things for Granted

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Ran takes some things for granted and gets some advice from an unexpected and somewhat suspect source.

Farfarello ghosted through the Goblin City, heading for the forest. Unseen, he slipped through the crowded, noxious streets; past the rude houses and grotesque statuary. He did not look back at the towering castle, nor did he pause at the gates. Without a backward glance, he glided between the gates and disappeared into the junkyard.

While he was within the realm of lost travelers and discarded dreams, the normal inhabitants of the junkyard were nowhere to be found. Even more so than the goblins, they had cause to fear the black clad killer. Schuldig did not keep as tight a rein on his pet once he passed outside the city walls.

Within a very short while, the scarred man reached the edge of the forest. Heedless of the wet and somewhat disturbing sounds issuing from the darkness beneath the trees, Farfarello moved swiftly between the clutching branches.

'Damn him.' Farfarello moved through the darkness and undergrowth without fear, his swift strides taking him further and further from the castle and its infuriating inhabitant.

Of the ten Guardians of the Labyrinth, six were assigned to specific areas. They had their own territories to control, and woe betide the creature who wandered there uninvited. The remaining four knew all of the passages and byways and used them as they pleased. Two of these, Yohji being one, had specific duties to discharge upon occasion. The other two, Farfarello and Crawford, wandered as they would unless commanded to some specific task by the Goblin King.

Farfarello passed through the forest, noting idly that Yohji had still not returned. He skirted the Bog of Eternal Stench, heading into the maze that comprised the inner gardens of the Labyrinth.

Eventually he came to a halt. He surveyed the familiar courtyard with its scattered statues and stone benches, breathing a small sigh of frustration.

"Crawford?"

There was no immediate answer, but Farfarello chose a convenient bench and settled down to wait. The other man was nearby, and would answer the Farfarello’s call as soon as he was able.

"We have a problem.”

**

Ran continued to run through the debris scattered corridor, his pounding feet the only noise that he could hear as it echoed and reverberated between the high walls. He ran until his breath came in ragged pants and his heart felt as though it would pound its way directly out of his chest.

And nothing changed. 

The corridor stretched ahead of him into the distance, a faint haze obscuring exactly how far it continued. The height of the walls never varied and there were no turns or forks to lead away from his chosen path.

He began to slow down, looking frantically this way and that for any variation, any change at all in the imposing walls, but there was nothing for him to see. Running out of breath altogether, he finally lost his temper, turning first to one side and then the other, kicking viciously against the stone walls.

"Another hour, gone!"

With a final snarl of anger, he slammed his back into one of the walls, sliding down it to end up hunched over his knees, his forehead resting on his arms as he tried not to panic.

"What’s the matter?”

He looked up, still breathing heavily, but saw no one. Looking to the left and then the right, he found that he was no longer alone. Leaning against an outcropping to his right, half concealed by one of the tree branches, was a woman.

Like himself, the new arrival had red hair. There the resemblance ended. Hers fell to her shoulders, thickly curled. She wore a business suit, with a skirt and high heels that matched the red of her hair . Ran thought for a moment of how wildly out of place Yohji had looked and mentally compared the image to the woman before him. Yohji practically blended in with the medieval scenery compared to her.

Attention completely derailed, he addressed her cautiously. "Did you say something?"

She smiled at him. "I asked what the matter was. You don’t look very good."

"Where did you come from?" he asked her, not moving from his slumped position.

"The same place you did," she told him. "But I had a bit of a head start. My name is Manx."

"Were you waiting for me?" Ran sighed heavily and leaned his head back against the wall.

"No. I heard you running and decided to wait for you to catch up." Manx smiled again. The expression suited her, but it didn’t make Ran’s wariness fade.

"You don't by any chance know how to get to the castle, do you?" he asked, suddenly hopeful.

She shook her head ruefully. "No. I’ve been lost here for a very long time myself."

He blinked, perplexed. "What?"

"The Goblin King doesn't allow his people to just run helter-skelter through this place, you know," she told him. "I'm restricted as to where I can go and what I can do. Some of the paths simply won’t open for me."

"Oh." Ran pulled himself dejectedly to his feet and stared down at his shoes.

"Why don't you come along with me?" she coaxed. "I have a home here, of sorts. You don’t need to go racing along the passage. Take a breath. Relax.”

"No, thank you. I… I don’t have a lot of time and I thought I could figure this place out, but it’s not even a proper maze! There were a million winding paths, and now there’s just… _this_!” Ran's frustration made him raise his voice as he spoke and he waved his arms for emphasis.

"That’s one way of looking at it," she told him, smothering a grin.

Ran shot her a suspicious glance, pushing his bangs out of his eyes with one hand. "How should I be looking at it?”

Manx let the grin shine through. "There are twists and turns everywhere. You don’t _have_ to follow the path you see.

Ran turned in a slow circle, casting a dubious glance at the walls to either side. Constructed of the same, dull grey stone as the outer wall, they stretched away seemingly to infinity. The rectangular, brick-like stones looked very, very solid and equally old. There were tall, climbing vines growing out of the wall at irregular intervals, and he could see moss clinging to some of the cracks.

Ran looked back at Manx, wondering if she'd lost her mind. "You want me to run into the wall?”

She smiled indulgently, as if humoring a small child. "I knew you’d look at it that way. You’ve been running for too long. Take a few breaths, let the oxygen back into your brain.”

"You just want me to give myself a concussion.” Ran turned back to look at the wall, a small voice in the back of his head urging him to keep this strange woman talking.

Manx chuckled. “Me? No. The Goblin King might find it entertaining, but that’s not my sort of joke.”

"What?" He stared at her. “Why do I believe that?”

"Because you’ve met him. If you don’t learn to take chances, you’ll never find your way out.” Manx gestured back the way he’d come. “And I really don’t think that’s the happy ending you’re looking for.”

“I don’t think any of the stories here end happily.” Ran rose to his feet and took one or two hesitant steps forward before coming to a halt. "I can’t just run into a wall.”

Manx sighed and crossed her arms. "Things aren't always what they seem in this place. You can't take anything for granted." She shook her head, sending those impossibly thick curls flying about her face. “Learn those lessons quickly, because you’ll hear them from _everyone_ in this place.”

“You want me to run into a wall.” He was certain she must be joking.

Manx shook her head. “I want you to find the way out, and you’ll have to leave this path to do it. You’ll do well not to simply take anyone’s word for things here – but you can test this for yourself. Leave the path, Ran. Don’t believe what you see. This is a fairy tale, and they’re darker and harder than people like to remember.”

“Don’t believe what you see.” Ran gave her another wary look before turning again, looking forward and behind before firmly setting his back to the direction he’d been running. “Thing’s aren’t what they seem. Take nothing for granted.”

“That’s about the size of it.” Manx watched him square his shoulders. “Do you know what you’re doing?”

“No. But if I wait for that, I’ll be here forever.”

“Truer words,” and her voice dropped suddenly, something wistful coloring her tone. “Truer words.”

When he turned back, questioning – she was gone.

“I am really beginning to _hate_ this place.” Taking a deep breath, Ran started back the way he’d come. After a few minutes, he closed his eyes, brought up his hands, and began moving very carefully to his right.

 

**

Takatori Mamoru was having a bad day. It had started out badly and only gotten worse from there.

He had been woken in the early hours of the morning by an exceedingly angry Crawford; never the best way to begin a morning. While on the errand he had been set, Mamoru had first been forced to pass through the tunnels beneath the main Labyrinth and skirt the Bog of Eternal Stench. It was while engaged in the second part of his trip that he had run into Schrient.

The female Guardians of this part of the Labyrinth held some sort of unexplained grudge against him, and they had pounced with nothing less than fiendish glee. Then again, he had given almost as good as he got. Despite his youth and relatively slight stature, the Takatori boy was not someone to mess with. Neu would be walking with a limp for quite some time and Hel was sporting quite the lovely black eye.

Overall, however, he had not fared well in that little encounter, which explained why he was currently trussed up like a Christmas goose and hanging upside down from a tree at the very edge of the territory guarded by the psychotic foursome.

Farfarello had passed by at one point, but Mamoru was not yet desperate enough to consider begging the older man for help. He had been incredibly fortunate to come out of his last encounter with the scarred killer relatively unscathed. So he had kept his mouth shut and watched the Goblin King's companion silently as he disappeared further into the forest.

They were all killers, but even Crawford maintained a healthy respect for Farfarello. The white-haired man was the only one not required to occasionally scout outside the walls of the Labyrinth. The single time he had been placed on this duty, he had disappeared into the Underground. When eventually retrieved, he had been literally soaked with blood. No one knew exactly where he had been or what he had done, save perhaps Schuldig.

No one dared ask.

Mamoru tugged experimentally at his bonds. He would eventually be able to wiggle free, hopefully before anyone happened upon him in his helpless state.

However, the Labyrinth being what it was, he had a sinking feeling that he would not get off that easily.

"Story of my life, really."


	6. A Pretty Little Angel

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which the plot develops nicely, thank you very much.

"All I want you to do is guard the bridge."

Ken sighed and nodded. "I understand that, Crawford. But -"

Crawford closed his eyes and fought back a rapidly worsening headache. "But what?"

"Guard it from who? This is the Bog of Eternal Stench. No one sane comes here voluntarily, not even Schrient!"

"The sanity of Schrient is debatable. Just guard the bridge, Hidaka. No one is to cross it. No one at all!" Turning, Crawford headed away from the younger man.

"Crawford?"

The American stopped, clenching his jaw before turning back. "What is it now!?"

"You just told me that I wasn't to let anyone cross the bridge," Ken pointed out sweetly.

Crawford, his feet mere inches from the edge of the rickety plank that was currently masquerading as the bridge, sighed. Ken was a past master at being deliberately obtuse when he felt put-upon. It was a habit which drove Crawford mad, something which the younger man was well aware of. "Do not push me this morning, Hidaka. Don't let any _strangers_ cross the bridge."

"What if they're with someone? You know Farfarello will sometimes drag people down here for swimming lessons."

"Don't let anyone cross the bridge without permission," Crawford snapped. He started across the plank, careful to keep his balance in the center.

Ken's voice floated after him. "Whose permission, exactly?"

Crawford ignored him. He'd already been in the Bog for far too long, and the residual smell would have seeped its way into his clothing. He wanted to bathe, and he knew that before he could, he would have to deal with Farfarello.

Ken watched the older man leave. "Great. Schuldig's playing another game, and I get to be bridge keeper. What a marvelous day this is shaping up to be."

**

Schuldig slouched down in the low chair that passed for his throne and watched Aya play with the goblins. She had given up trying to teach them even the simplest of card games and was now busily engaged in explaining the principles behind playing 'tag'.

He found her amusing. Farfarello had been right, the girl was far too old to be a goblin and much too bright. She was, unfortunately, too young to become one of the guardians. This left him with a minor problem. Rising to his feet, the Goblin King threaded his way between his much shorter subjects and stopped behind the little girl.

"Whatever am I going to do with you?" he mused.

The little girl turned and looked solemnly up at her kidnapper. "You said that I could go home when Ran got here. We could go and look for him."

Schuldig shook his head. "No. He has to find the way on his own."

"Why?" As soon as Aya's attention had been diverted, several of her goblin playmates took the opportunity to edge quietly toward the door. Her games were too taxing, both mentally and physically, for their mostly sedentary habits.

Waving the few remaining goblins away, Schuldig sank to his heels beside her. "Because he made a foolish wish, and now he must live with the consequences."

Aya thought about that for a moment or two. "I wish I could go home," she told him.

The Goblin King burst into delighted laughter. "Clever girl! But I can't grant that wish. Until your brother either succeeds or fails, you do not belong to either world and I can't work any magic for you."

"What happens if he fails?"

"I'm not certain." Schuldig frowned for a moment. "The only other children near your age to end up here were ... older." That was putting it gently. Victims of kidnap and neglect didn't usually come under his purview, and the two that he _had_ 'acquired' were indeed far older than their physical ages.

"You're not going to make me a goblin?" Aya was suddenly a lot more cheerful.

Schuldig shook his head. "No. You're too old."

"Good." Aya relaxed a little and finally noticed the absence of the goblins. She frowned accusingly up at Schuldig. "Where did they go?"

He shrugged and rose to his feet. "I have no idea. Wherever goblins go when they're not cluttering up the place. Probably to find something to eat."

"Then _you_ have to play with me."

"I see...." Schuldig looked down at the girl and heaved in inward sigh. 'I foresee a long afternoon of Go Fish. Where's Far when you need him?'

Aya had already retrieved the worn pack of cards and was looking up at him hopefully.

"I don't suppose you know how to play poker do you, sweetheart?"

**

Farfarello’s somewhat impatient waiting came to an end as Crawford entered the small courtyard. "Where have you been, as if I couldn't tell?"

"The Bog does leave a certain mark on its visitors," the older man agreed shortly. "What do you want?"

"This new one is a bit too stubborn for my liking," Farfarello said. "I think that our King has bitten off more than he can chew."

Crawford raised his eyebrows. "Are you really worried? I haven't seen the boy myself, but this game is rigged against him. It would be nearly impossible for him to win through to the castle before his time runs out."

"Nearly impossible is merely unlikely," Farfarello argued grimly. "If Schuldig loses this game, he won't be the only one to pay the penalty. He's playing with the future of the entire Labyrinth."

"There are ways around even that," Crawford pointed out, but his expression had become thoughtful. "I assume that you had some plan when you decided to come to me?"

Farfarello nodded. "We need to stack the deck even further in our favor, I think. I don't have time to find Mamoru or Nagi, but I should be able to set something up with Schrient. You can work on the Labyrinth itself. It listens to you."

Crawford nodded slowly. "All right. But before anything else -"

"You need a bath," Farfarello finished the sentence for him. "I'll check back with you later."

**

Mamoru continued to work carefully on the ropes that held him suspended upside down. He had managed to work one arm free, but could not figure out how to loosen his remaining bonds without ending up crashing headfirst into the paving stones below.

Muttering dark things under his breath, the teenager wondered if Yohji would be awake yet. The blonde occasionally wandered this section of the hedge maze. He might have to suffer through a few minutes of hysterical laughter and several months of merciless teasing, but at least the older man would set him free. Eventually.

With his current luck, Yohji wouldn't get here until well after -

There was a rustling in the underbrush and the sound of whispered voices.

"Oh hell. I _hate_ it when I'm right."

**

Ran fumbled forward, eyes closed, until he hit the wall on the right. Keeping his fingers against it, he kept moving forward until paranoia told him he’d walk smack into Schuldig, or that nutcase from outside the Labyrinth, and he opened his eyes.

There was no trace of the long, straight passage that had kept him penned in for over an hour. Instead, he was standing six paces or so before a four-way junction – and behind him was a definite fork. 

“… so that’s how this works.” He scowled. It wasn’t going to be safe to simply stumble about with his eyes closed, but at least he was free of whatever that first mess had been. 

Ran continued grimly down the new corridor for five minutes before deciding that he wasn't going to get anywhere without thinking this through. He looked down at his watch.

‘I have about eleven and a half hours to find my way through this crazy place to the castle. I have my watch, my clothes. –‘ The young man frowned and dug in the pockets of his jeans. For once, his habit of forgetting to check his pockets when he changed his clothes might possibly pay off. "One bus pass. Two permanent markers. Ten dollars. Dad's last pack of cigarettes."

Ran gave the almost full pack a disgusted look. He and his mother tried to discourage his father's smoking habit by making off with his cigarettes whenever he put them down for as much as a minute. Unfortunately, this tactic was meeting with only limited success. 

Nothing immediately useful – but he’d think of something.

He’d have to.


	7. Wordplay Gets You Nowhere.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Ran learns about choices.

Crawford hurried through a quick bath, changed his clothes and started toward the castle. The Labyrinth was, in some ways, a living organism. It had a sort of semi-sentient will of its own and, with sufficient attention and prodding, would occasionally do as it was told. It did not listen to everyone, however, and it was by sheer chance that Farfarello had discovered that Crawford was one of those people.

The Labyrinth would not actually keep Ran from reaching his goal; that would be against the rules that Schuldig had laid down. However, with a little encouragement, it would willingly make things more difficult for the boy.

A small, tight-lipped smile crossed Crawford's face as various walls and obstacles melted out of his path. The Labyrinth was in a friendly mood, apparently. This should not be terribly difficult after all.

**

Ran had discovered that, with a little effort, his permanent markers could be used to draw arrows on the stone that made up this section of the Labyrinth. He threaded his way further into the gigantic maze, carefully stopping at every intersection to  
mark the path he had chosen to take.

In a conventional maze, this tactic might actually have worked. Unfortunately for Ran, the Labyrinth was well acquainted with such tactics and had counter-measures well in hand. As Ran made his way carefully down the long, apparently deserted, stone corridors, the area around him was a buzz of silent activity.

He eventually left the dank, claustrophobic corridors behind, emerging into a more haphazardly arranged area with odd, free-standing walls and pillars. He continued on, carefully marking his path, and moving steadily forward.

In his wake walls shifted, pillars rotated and the small stones that made up the path flipped themselves over and turned themselves around. Every mark that Ran made was shifted, altered or removed from view entirely. Unaware of the potentially disastrous happenings in his wake, Ran moved resolutely forward - permanent marker in hand.

Coming to a dead end, he sighed. The castle was set upon a hill, above the Goblin City, and he could see it clearly from here. It was still a very long way away and, checking his watch, he had less than 10 hours to reach it. He looked back up at the castle, imagining that he could hear his little sister's voice calling him.

**

"Full house beats two pair!"

"Are you _sure_ you've never played this game before?"

**

Ran sighed again and shook his head. "I'm coming, Aya." He turned and glanced down to check the mark he had made just before stepping into the dead end. It was not pointing directly toward him, as it should be, but to his left. He walked over to the black arrow and stared at it, horrified.

“I’m not even _surprised_ ,” he finally declared. “Of course he cheats.”

“Of course.” 

It might almost have been an echo, dry and whispering, the words bouncing against the stone.

Almost.

Ran turned, slowly and carefully, clutching the marker as if it were a weapon that might provide some measure of defense against whatever surprises the Labyrinth threw at him next.

The passage he’d just come through was gone. Without a sound, the huge walls had shifted, leaving Ran stranded in a cul de sac. He stared, fists clenching, imagining he could actually hear the time slipping through his fingers. “I just… that’s not _fair_.”

“It’s not fair.”

He turned faster this time, trying to catch the stones shifting or the owner of that dusty voice. 

The dead end was no longer an empty corner. Propped against an otherwise blank wall were a pair of wooden slabs. If he squinted just right, they looked like doors. Primitive, scratched, held to the wall with heavy, scarred hinges –

“Doors?” He moved closer, still wary. 

Closer to, they were definitely doors. Tall and ancient, grimy with accumulated dust, they had no visible handle or latch. One had hinges to the left and one to the right, but otherwise there was little to choose between them.

“Doors. Where do they _lead_?”

“To the castle. To the way out. To the end.” The whispers echoed oddly and Ran tilted his head, trying to figure out where they were coming from.

“To the end of what?” Ran was fairly sure that the whispers were coming from _behind_ the doors. That wasn’t as reassuring as he’d’ve liked it to be. 

“The story. The Labyrinth.” There was a faint scrape that followed the words, and Ran’s overactive imagination was telling him that it was the sound of claws or of other sharp, horrible things. “Life.”

He glanced over his shoulder, finding himself still closed within the dead end. The walls stretched far above his reach, smooth, and not allowing any purchase for climbing. Ran was trapped. The doors were the only possibly way out, and even that was chancy, given the lack of handle or knob.

“To the castle?” He was careful not to get too close.

“To the castle.” There was a pause, and again that faint, rattling scrape. “Or not.”

Ran shifted uneasily at the odd sound, his imagination weighing it against the feeling of time running out. “How do I get to the castle?”

“Through the door.”

“I hate riddles. I hate this Labyrinth. I hate it all.” Ran kept the words just under his breath as he looked from one door to the other. “Which door?”

“The correct door.” This time, the rattling scrape was almost a laugh, or at least Ran’s imagination wanted it to be. 

Ran shifted uncomfortably. “How do I open the door?”

“Choose. Choose a door. The way will open.”

He decided, then and there, that the scraping _was_ claws. Claws and some guardian out of nightmare that lurked beneath the stones he stood upon. His little sister had delighted in some of the more ghoulish and macabre fairy tales, the older ones and the modern ones. He’d never had a taste for them himself, but he’d read them for her.

Not all that glittered was gold, and sometimes the shape in the shadows was _not_ the clothes you’d left thrown over a chair. The monsters in the darkness were real, and they only rules they played by were their own. 

Ran grit his teeth. He could still win. He could still find his way to the castle. He could still rescue his sister. He would just have to be very, very careful.

Or possibly very dead.

“This isn’t part of the story.” He hadn’t meant to say it aloud.

“It is a part of _your_ story.” The voice… no, it was _voices_. He was almost sure of it. The voices sounded pleased with his response, and it made his skin crawl. “Choose.”

“I won’t choose blindly.” Not that he had any choice, but Ran forced his shoulders back and chin up. “Two doors. One leads to the castle. One… doesn’t.” His voice cracked a little, but he bore down grimly. “Tell me more.”

“What,” and the voices were moving, either behind those walls or beneath his feet, “would you know?”

“He, the Goblin King, he gave me thirteen hours to reach the castle. If I were to choose the wrong door – if that were to, to end my story,” and there was a euphemism he dearly hoped didn’t mean what he thought it did, “wouldn’t that make him a liar? It would end my time early.”

A hiss, that came from somewhere behind? Ran caught himself turning away from the doors and forced himself to stop. “Well?”

“It _would_.” The voices were sharp, unhappy. 

“So – if I choose wrongly, I still have my remaining time.”

“What isss left of it.” A raspy laugh, definitely from behind. Ran risked a look over his shoulder, but there was no one there. “To the castle – or not.”

“Can you give me a hint, at least? Something?”

“Perhapssss. Asssk.”

Ran shivered, stepping forward to gingerly brush his fingers against the door to the left. “Will this door take me to my sister?”

“It will.” The rasping, slithering sounds ceased.

“Are you lying to me?”

“Yesss.”

Ran grit his teeth. “So it doesn’t matter. None of it matters. Fine.” He slammed both palms against the door. “This one. I choose _this_ one.”

“You disssapoint usss.”

Whatever else the voices might have said was drowned out by Ran’s own, angry shriek as the door _spun_ , top to bottom, and swept him through the darkened opening and into darkness.

Perched behind one of the blockish statues atop the wall, Farfarello couldn't contain the smile that crept across his pale face as he listened to Ran’s voice dwindle away. As the dusty voices expressed their balked fury at Ran’s choice.

"The Labyrinth doesn’t like this any more than we do, it seems.” He slipped from the top of the wall, landing easily on the far side. “Let's see if the boy can find his way out of _that_."

**

Yohji finished cleaning up after the Labyrinth's unwelcome visitors and made his way swiftly through the huge maze. On a good day, it usually took him a half an hour to make it to the castle from the outer walls. Today it took almost an hour and a half.

"Someone's put the thing in a cheerful mood." The Labyrinth normally was a fairly good indicator of the mood of its King, but the thing had its quirks. Some days it made life easy for Yohji. Sometimes it just liked to screw around.

Yohji made his way through the Goblin City easily enough, ignoring the chattering of the inhabitants, and passed into the castle without any further difficulty.

"Flush."

"Like my chances of winning this game."

Yohji paused at the doorway of the throne room, frozen by surprise. Schuldig was lying on his stomach in the center of a clear patch of floor. The Goblin King was staring disgustedly at a little girl who was almost invisible, wrapped as she was in the enveloping folds of his cloak. She also had quite a pile of various small trinkets in front of her.

"Your Majesty?"

Schuldig didn't bother to look up from where the little girl was inexpertly shuffling the cards. "The boy has fallen into the oubliette. Find him, rescue him, give him a hard time and take him back to the gates."

"The oubliette?" Yohji blinked. At least the kid didn’t take the _other_ route. He’d’ve been picking up the boy with a _sponge_. “That can't be good.”

"He shouldn't have gotten that far – and nearly didnt," Schuldig agreed grimly, accepting his cards and glancing at them. "Get him back to the beginning and do your damndest to talk him out of trying again."

"That's not fair," a clear voice chided them.

Both men looked at the little girl in disbelief.

"It's not _meant_ to be fair," Schuldig told her patiently.

"That's mean."

Yohji bit his lip to keep from breaking down laughing. Seeing the Goblin King be taken to task by a very small girl was even better than watching Crawford turn purple.

Schuldig curled his lips back from his teeth and gave Aya his best feral snarl. "I'm the villain, remember? Mean is part of my job description."

Aya sniffed at him and turned her attention back to her cards.

"Why are you still here, Kudou?"

Yohji took the hint and left, shaking his head. What the hell was going on here? That _couldn't_ be the sister. She was too old. _Much_ too old.

"What is he thinking?"

**

Ran plummeted forward and then _down_ through the semi-darkness, his fall somewhat slowed by – something he tried very hard not to think too much about. He’d have bruises, that was certain, but at least he’d survive the fall.

He hoped.


	8. False Alarms

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Yohji, somewhat recovered, makes a second appearance.

Yohji was halfway through the Goblin City before realizing that he’d forgotten to raid Schuldig’s cigarette stash on his way out of the castle. He blamed it on the shock of finding the Goblin King playing poker with an eight year old and apparently losing; that and his worsening headache. The full effects of his hangover were only just passing, as Crawford and Schuldig had inconsiderately woken him only shortly after he had managed to fall asleep.

“Damn, damn, damn!”

Cigarettes were not something easily come by inside the Goblin King’s magical realm. Luckily, Schuldig had picked up the habit from Yohji and always had a full pack nearby. He wouldn’t actually conjure them up for the blond, but never seemed to mind when some of his own supply disappeared.

At the moment, Yohji was dying for a nicotine fix and had only one cigarette left.

“Oh well.” He paused to light up in the middle of the street, smirking a little as the various goblins gave him a wide berth. He rarely came this way, and Schuldig’s creatures never knew quite what to make of him. While he didn’t seem hostile, they were more used to Farfarello.

Farfarello never _seemed_ hostile. That didn’t make his habits pleasant.

Yohji took a deep breath, savoring the smoke and feeling himself beginning to relax. He’d fish the brat out of the dark hole and put him back outside the gates. Easy enough. Then he’d stop back here to report and filch a new pack of cigarettes at the same time.

His day was looking up.

Finally.

**

Farfarello waited patiently until the Labyrinth shifted again, allowing him access to the ‘dead end’ where Fujimiya Ran had just discovered once again not to take anything for granted. 

The voices, moving and circling beneath the stone were still complaining about having to let the boy pass, undigested. The complaints ended the very instant Farfarello’s boots touched the stone of their courtyard.

Smiling slightly, he moved to the still moving door and stilled its motion. Resting his own palms flat against the wood, he spoke. “If he comes back this way, tell him that the doors only open once.”

“We wisssh to keep him.”

Farfarello turned a razor-edged smile on the stones. “There are other roads to the center. You may not have him before his time runs out.”

There was a perfect silence as Farfarello turned on his heel and disappeared further into the Labyrinth, walls moving swiftly out of his way as he went.

**

Furious, humiliated and afraid, Ran fell. Or ricocheted gently from unseen object to object. The best that could be said of his downward motion was that he was unlikely to break any bones. His attempts at grasping the roots or branches or whatever the objects were, had no real effect. He couldn’t actually get a grip on anything, turning the fall into a sliding bounce that made him think of pachinko.

The fall also went on for what became a disturbingly long time. 

In the growing darkness, with only his imagination to keep him company and the rustle and thump of his own downward progress, it seemed to take forever. Hitting bottom was anti-climactic, if mildly painful, and with a flat ‘crack’.

Bruised and out of breath, Ran rolled gingerly over onto his back, staring upward at the faint gleam of light far, far above. The surface beneath him was smooth, not flat, but with a curve he could feel, his head above his feet. He lay there for several minutes, slowly getting his breath back. There was barely enough light to see his fingers if he held them up and wiggled them, not enough to make out any real details of anything.

‘What do I do now?’

He struggled to remember the details of the familiar story. He knew there were only the barest of similarities, but surely there would be _something_. 

Young princess, baby prince – she wishes her brother away to the Goblin King and must retrieve him by finding her way to the Goblin castle and demanding the baby’s return.

It was a simple story, one of his favorites because of that simplicity. A young girl, learning that actions have consequences and choosing to take on a task out of nightmare in order to make things right and having her bravery and determination be rewarded when she does the right thing.

Not something he really thought was _this_ Goblin King’s modus operandi.

‘Maybe no similarities at _all_.’

He raised his arm, squinting to get a look at his watch. There was a faint glow from the numbers, almost enough to make out – but the slide of his fingers against the glass revealed that the case was bent and the crystal shattered.

“… no. No, no no.” Ran held it to his ear, attempting to hear the comforting tick. He couldn’t tell if the watch was still ticking over the sudden pounding of his heart. Shoving himself to a sitting position – 

The movement caused a sudden, ominous ‘crack’ and a shifting in the surface beneath him. Ran slipped, landing on one elbow, and the surface gave way entirely, dropping him downward again, this time with no obstacles to help break the fall.

_\- watch out!_

Another surface that cracked beneath his weight, slowing him slightly. The voices echoing this time were distinct, loud and human.

_\- too much blood, press harder and -_

Another, and the voices were fast and angry, echoing slightly and making them hard to follow.

_\- just toying with us now, the bastards._

Ran hit another surface, this one damp and unyielding, knocking the breath from him entirely. He lay there, gasping, head spinning, as he tried to find some kind of mental and emotional balance. 

He was lost now, really lost, and he had no idea how much time he had left or how much this fall had wasted. He was worn out, hurting, hungry – and giving up wasn’t an option. He couldn’t let this place take his sister. _Couldn’t_.

‘How could I have been so stupid? How could I have let this happen.’ He curled up on his side, wrapping his arms around his knees. ‘Aya - I’m sorry.’

**

Crawford rolled one of Schuldig’s innumerable crystals between his hands, frowning. Mamoru wasn’t in any of his normal haunts and had never returned from his errand that morning. Nagi was also missing although the boy had taken to wandering lately, getting to know the various creatures that inhabited his assigned segment of the gigantic maze.

Everyone else was accounted for, although Yohji was apparently having problems with the Labyrinth today. That was odd and it bothered him. Other than Schuldig, the Labyrinth really only responded well to two people. Crawford was one and Yohji was the other. If Yohji was having problems, there must be something else going on beneath the surface.

‘I’ll look into it once this little mess has been taken care of,’ Crawford decided. He turned the crystal and concentrated on Farfarello.

Farfarello was almost to the edge of Schrient’s chosen territory. While the Labyrinth listened intently to Crawford and normally indulged Yohji, it tended to treat Farfarello as an extension of itself. The Irishman occasionally had more success than either of the other two in finding his way through the vast array of paths and tunnels. On the other hand, he also had to tread the paths that the Labyrinth chose for him, and not the other way around. Overall, Crawford preferred being the one in control.

There was very little of control about his current situation, and it set Crawford’s teeth on edge.

“Schuldig can’t be allowed to screw this up for us,” Crawford whispered, brows furrowing. “He can't break the rules without ruining everything for all of us, and I won’t stand for it.”

**

Ran sat in the darkness, still hugging his knees. He was angry and frustrated, but he had not given up hope yet. He was still hoping that his eyes would adjust to the miniscule amount of light still filtering down from above. After that, he would be able to concentrate on finding a way out of wherever he was.

“How the hell did you end up down here?” 

“AAAA!” Ran jumped, eyes wide in the darkness. “Who’s there?”

“Calm down, kid. You’ll give yourself an aneurysm.” A clicking noise heralded a tiny flicker of flame, and Ran found himself nose to midriff with the murderer from outside the gates.

Ran managed not to yelp again, and scooted rapidly backward. Yohji ignored him, instead using his lighter to ignite the wick on a lantern that he had just unhooked from one of the moss-covered walls. After a moment the room became brighter, and Ran seized the opportunity to look around.

It was a small, dreary room. Stone walls, stone floor and, just for variety, a stone ceiling surrounded them. The small opening he had been dropped through was indeed over ten feet above his head. Everything was grey or brown and aside for the occasional crumpled pile of fabric -

‘Oh please don’t let any of those have bodies under them.’

\- the room was bare.

“You must have fallen from above,” Yohji concluded. “I’m impressed. You managed to cover a lot of ground. Not quite the record, but close.”

Ran snarled at him wordlessly and pulled himself to his feet. He prowled around the room, letting his hands skim across the walls as he searched for a hidden exit. It didn’t take Ran long to discover that there appeared to be no other way in or out of the room.

“How did you get in here?” he demanded.

Yohji quirked an eyebrow. “Same way I’ll be getting out. Wanna come along?”

“Yes!”

“All righty. The Kudou express to the main gate will be leaving in…” Yohji glanced at his watch. “About two minutes.”

“The main gate?”

Yohji smothered a sigh. The two minutes was to allow for the inevitable temper tantrum. “That’s where I’m headed. Take it or leave it.”

“I can’t go back now! I don’t have the _time_.” Ran took a deep breath, clenched his teeth and wrestled himself back to at least a semblance of calm. “Please, can’t you just let me out?”

“No. There are some very nasty and dangerous creatures in this part of the Labyrinth. If I just let you out, you’re going to get your ass killed.”

“Then come with me, please? Or at least take me as far as you can.” Ran turned suddenly pleading eyes on the blonde, lower lip caught between his teeth.

Yohji was taken aback by the sudden change in the arrogant young man and frowned. Schuldig would stake him out for monster bait if he didn’t follow his orders to the letter. “I can’t. I’m supposed to take you back to the beginning and that’s what I’ll do.”

“Just let me out. I’ll make my own way, then.”

“I can’t. It’s the gates or nothing,” Yohji told him, fidgeting slightly. 

Ran smiled internally. He had read the other man correctly. This guy was a total softy, despite his external appearance. He managed a faint quaver in his voice to match his suddenly quivering lip. “Please…. My, my sister….”

Absent-mindedly, Yohji pulled his pack of cigarettes from a pocket and fished one out, or tried to. He had forgotten that the pack was empty. He stared at it for a long moment, frustration mounting. “Damn it!”

‘Ah hah.’ Ran reached into his pocket and pulled out his father’s cigarettes and tapped the pack thoughtfully against his cheek. He had Yohji’s instant and almost undivided attention.

“Where did you get those?”

“We’re trying to convince my father to quit,” Ran informed him, watching Yohji’s eyes track every movement of the pack with careful hope.

“Those are my brand,” Yohji muttered, practically salivating at the sight. Schuldig may have picked up his habit from the blonde, but he favored a much harsher blend of tobacco. Yohji would suffer a lot for his addiction, but with the brand he loved directly before him?

“Oh? Would you like them?” Ran offered, raising his eyebrows.

Yohji’s fingers had actually brushed the package before Ran jerked it away. Yohji repressed a snarl of frustration and looked down to see that all traces of the defenseless, pleading teenager had disappeared. The young man staring back at him had iron in the back of his gaze.

“I’ll give them to you if you’ll get me out of here and show me the way to the castle,” Ran promised. Smiling, he returned to tapping the almost full pack against one cheek.

“The Goblin King will gut me,” Yohji protested. He folded his arms and leaned back against the wall again. “No deal.”

His eyes, however, continued to follow the movement of the cigarettes.

“Oh. Too bad,” Ran shrugged and went to tuck the cigarettes back into his pocket. The movement was arrested by Yohji’s sudden grip on his wrist.

“Look, I’ll let you out and take you back to the gates.”

Ran twisted his wrist out of the older man’s grip. “It’s the castle or nothing.”

“You can follow me out of here,” Yohji offered. “That’s it. Take it or leave it.”

Ran withdrew two cigarettes and offered them. “For that, I’ll give you two. Now get me the hell out of here.”

“All of them.”

“Five. You want the whole pack, you’ll have to take me to the castle.”

“Five.”

Five were extended . “Get me out of here.”

He was forced to wait, however, as the first thing Yohji did was light up. Ignoring the redhead’s exaggerated coughing and waving motions, the blonde took a deep breath and smiled sleepily.

“Oh, that’s much better.”

“That’s totally a matter of opinion,” Ran said, wrinkling his nose. “Out?.”

“Certainly!” Yohji kicked aside a formless mass of brown fabric to reveal a door lying on the floor. He picked it up and rested it against what appeared to be a natural indentation in the wall. He twisted the ring that passed for a handle and pulled it open. There was a feminine scream, and a loofah bounced off his head.

Hastily slamming the door, Yohji looked over his shoulder to see Ran regarding him with some scorn and a raised eyebrow.

“Eh-heh.” Twisting the ring again, Yohji pulled the door open in the opposite direction, revealing a long, narrow passageway. “C’mon kid. Let’s get this over with before his Majesty figures out I just sold him down the river for a handful of cigarettes.”

**

Mamoru, still upside down, swore under his breath. There were goblins and then there were goblins. The misfits that crowded the Goblin City and the Castle were generally small and mostly harmless. Then there were the members of Schuldig’s guard.

The guards were larger than the average run of goblin, uglier too. They were stronger and meaner than the others and they tended to travel in packs. He was currently surrounded by four of them.

‘I am so very screwed.’

He concentrated on the hideous revenge which he would wreak on Schrient when he finally managed to work his way free of his bonds. The goblins wouldn’t hurt him too badly, they wouldn’t dare, but this was certainly not going to be any fun.

‘Damn you, Yohji. Where are you?!’

**

Yohji stalked down the dimly lit stone hallway, muttering around his cigarette. He should not be doing this. If Crawford found out, he’d rat Yohji out to Schuldig, and his punishment would be… severe.

Something about all of this was bothering him, but he couldn’t pin down exactly what. The kid’s sister was too old, really. The kid himself didn’t fit the normal type to end up wandering here. He was too determined, too focused. The teenager had also managed to get a hell of a long way toward the castle in a _very_ short time. Bruised, scratched and obviously frightened, he was still fighting tooth and nail - another bad sign. To top it all off, the Labyrinth was acting weird.

“Where are you taking me?”

“Toward the castle,” Yohji told him. “Shut up and let me concentrate or the damn tunnel will end up feeding us back into the oubliette.”

“The what?” Ran asked, trotting along at his heels.

“Oubliette. It’s from the French. I’m sure you can figure out what it means.”

Ran swallowed, again wondering just what was going to happen to him if he failed. He followed obediently behind the older man, wondering again at the incongruity of his dress and mannerisms here in the fantasy that was the Labyrinth.

‘Sunglasses underground?’

Lost in thought, Ran leaped about a foot in the air when a deep voice suddenly rumbled, “Don’t go on!”

Yohji also started, but clapped both hands to his ears and winced. “Damn it all…. Not so fucking _loud_!”

There was no response. Ran looked around to see a stone face as tall as he was, carved into the wall. It rolled stone eyes toward him even as Yohji grabbed his wrist and continued to stalk down the passageway.

“Turn back while you still can!”

Ran caught this one with its lips still moving. Yohji let out a strangled whimper and increased his pace.

“What are they?” Ran asked him, trying to tug his arm free.

“False alarms,” Yohji told him, face twisted painfully.

“Are they dangerous?” Ran crowded slightly closer to Yohji, as if afraid one of the graven faces might grow arms and grab him.

Yohji winced again. “Only to my hangover.”

 

False Alarms

In which Yohji, somewhat recovered, makes a second appearance.

**

Yohji was halfway through the Goblin City before realizing that he’d forgotten to raid Schuldig’s cigarette stash on his way out of the castle. He blamed it on the shock of finding the Goblin King playing poker with an eight year old and apparently losing; that and his worsening headache. The full effects of his hangover were only just passing, as Crawford and Schuldig had inconsiderately woken him only shortly after he had managed to fall asleep.

“Damn, damn, damn!”

Cigarettes were not something easily come by inside the Goblin King’s magical realm. Luckily, Schuldig had picked up the habit from Yohji and always had a full pack nearby. He wouldn’t actually conjure them up for the blond, but never seemed to mind when some of his own supply disappeared.

At the moment, Yohji was dying for a nicotine fix and had only one cigarette left.

“Oh well.” He paused to light up in the middle of the street, smirking a little as the various goblins gave him a wide berth. He rarely came this way, and Schuldig’s creatures never knew quite what to make of him. While he didn’t seem hostile, they were more used to Farfarello.

Farfarello never _seemed_ hostile. That didn’t make his habits pleasant.

Yohji took a deep breath, savoring the smoke and feeling himself beginning to relax. He’d fish the brat out of the dark hole and put him back outside the gates. Easy enough. Then he’d stop back here to report and filch a new pack of cigarettes at the same time.

His day was looking up.

Finally.

**

Farfarello waited patiently until the Labyrinth shifted again, allowing him access to the ‘dead end’ where Fujimiya Ran had just discovered once again not to take anything for granted. 

The voices, moving and circling beneath the stone were still complaining about having to let the boy pass, undigested. The complaints ended the very instant Farfarello’s boots touched the stone of their courtyard.

Smiling slightly, he moved to the still moving door and stilled its motion. Resting his own palms flat against the wood, he spoke. “If he comes back this way, tell him that the doors only open once.”

“We wisssh to keep him.”

Farfarello turned a razor-edged smile on the stones. “There are other roads to the center. You may not have him before his time runs out.”

There was a perfect silence as Farfarello turned on his heel and disappeared further into the Labyrinth, walls moving swiftly out of his way as he went.

**

Furious, humiliated and afraid, Ran fell. Or ricocheted gently from unseen object to object. The best that could be said of his downward motion was that he was unlikely to break any bones. His attempts at grasping the roots or branches or whatever the objects were, had no real effect. He couldn’t actually get a grip on anything, turning the fall into a sliding bounce that made him think of pachinko.

The fall also went on for what became a disturbingly long time. 

In the growing darkness, with only his imagination to keep him company and the rustle and thump of his own downward progress, it seemed to take forever. Hitting bottom was anti-climactic, if mildly painful, and with a flat ‘crack’.

Bruised and out of breath, Ran rolled gingerly over onto his back, staring upward at the faint gleam of light far, far above. The surface beneath him was smooth, not flat, but with a curve he could feel, his head above his feet. He lay there for several minutes, slowly getting his breath back. There was barely enough light to see his fingers if he held them up and wiggled them, not enough to make out any real details of anything.

‘What do I do now?’

He struggled to remember the details of the familiar story. He knew there were only the barest of similarities, but surely there would be _something_. 

Young princess, baby prince – she wishes her brother away to the Goblin King and must retrieve him by finding her way to the Goblin castle and demanding the baby’s return.

It was a simple story, one of his favorites because of that simplicity. A young girl, learning that actions have consequences and choosing to take on a task out of nightmare in order to make things right and having her bravery and determination be rewarded when she does the right thing.

Not something he really thought was _this_ Goblin King’s modus operandi.

‘Maybe no similarities at _all_.’

He raised his arm, squinting to get a look at his watch. There was a faint glow from the numbers, almost enough to make out – but the slide of his fingers against the glass revealed that the case was bent and the crystal shattered.

“… no. No, no no.” Ran held it to his ear, attempting to hear the comforting tick. He couldn’t tell if the watch was still ticking over the sudden pounding of his heart. Shoving himself to a sitting position – 

The movement caused a sudden, ominous ‘crack’ and a shifting in the surface beneath him. Ran slipped, landing on one elbow, and the surface gave way entirely, dropping him downward again, this time with no obstacles to help break the fall.

_\- watch out!_

Another surface that cracked beneath his weight, slowing him slightly. The voices echoing this time were distinct, loud and human.

_\- too much blood, press harder and -_

Another, and the voices were fast and angry, echoing slightly and making them hard to follow.

_\- just toying with us now, the bastards._

Ran hit another surface, this one damp and unyielding, knocking the breath from him entirely. He lay there, gasping, head spinning, as he tried to find some kind of mental and emotional balance. 

He was lost now, really lost, and he had no idea how much time he had left or how much this fall had wasted. He was worn out, hurting, hungry – and giving up wasn’t an option. He couldn’t let this place take his sister. _Couldn’t_.

‘How could I have been so stupid? How could I have let this happen.’ He curled up on his side, wrapping his arms around his knees. ‘Aya - I’m sorry.’

**

Crawford rolled one of Schuldig’s innumerable crystals between his hands, frowning. Mamoru wasn’t in any of his normal haunts and had never returned from his errand that morning. Nagi was also missing although the boy had taken to wandering lately, getting to know the various creatures that inhabited his assigned segment of the gigantic maze.

Everyone else was accounted for, although Yohji was apparently having problems with the Labyrinth today. That was odd and it bothered him. Other than Schuldig, the Labyrinth really only responded well to two people. Crawford was one and Yohji was the other. If Yohji was having problems, there must be something else going on beneath the surface.

‘I’ll look into it once this little mess has been taken care of,’ Crawford decided. He turned the crystal and concentrated on Farfarello.

The Irishman was almost to the edge of Schrient’s chosen territory. While the Labyrinth listened intently to Crawford and normally indulged Yohji, it tended to treat Farfarello as an extension of itself. The Irishman occasionally had more success than either of the other two in finding his way through the vast array of paths and tunnels. On the other hand, he also had to tread the paths that the Labyrinth chose for him, and not the other way around. Overall, Crawford preferred being the one in control.

There was very little of control about the current situation, and it set Crawford’s teeth on edge.

“Schuldig can’t be allowed to screw this up for us,” Crawford whispered, brows furrowing. “I won’t stand for it.”

**

Ran sat in the darkness, still hugging his knees. He was angry and frustrated, but he had not given up hope yet. He was still hoping that his eyes would adjust to the miniscule amount of light still filtering down from above. After that, he would be able to concentrate on finding a way out of wherever he was.

“How the hell did you end up down here?” 

“AAAA!” Ran jumped, eyes wide in the darkness. “Who’s there?”

“Calm down, kid. You’ll give yourself an aneurysm.” A clicking noise heralded a tiny flicker of flame, and Ran found himself nose to midriff with the murderer from outside the gates.

Ran managed not to yelp again, and scooted rapidly backward. Yohji ignored him, instead using his lighter to ignite the wick on a lantern that he had just unhooked from one of the moss-covered walls. After a moment the room became brighter, and Ran seized the opportunity to look around.

It was a small, dreary room. Stone walls, stone floor and, just for variety, a stone ceiling surrounded them. The small opening he had been dropped through was indeed over ten feet above his head. Everything was grey or brown and aside for the occasional crumpled pile of fabric -

‘Oh please don’t let any of those have bodies under them.’

\- the room was bare.

“You must have fallen from above,” Yohji concluded. “I’m impressed. You managed to cover a lot of ground. Not quite the record, but close.”

Ran snarled at him wordlessly and pulled himself to his feet. He prowled around the room, letting his hands skim across the walls as he searched for a hidden exit. It didn’t take Ran long to discover that there appeared to be no other way in or out of the room.

“How did you get in here?” he demanded.

Yohji quirked an eyebrow. “Same way I’ll be getting out. Wanna come along?”

“Yes!”

“All righty. The Kudou express to the main gate will be leaving in…” Yohji glanced at his watch. “About two minutes.”

“The main gate?”

Yohji smothered a sigh. The two minutes was to allow for the inevitable temper tantrum. “That’s where I’m headed. Take it or leave it.”

“I can’t go back now! I don’t have the _time_.” Ran took a deep breath, clenched his teeth and wrestled himself back to at least a semblance of calm. “Please, can’t you just let me out?”

“No. There are some very nasty and dangerous creatures in this part of the Labyrinth. If I just let you out, you’re going to get your ass killed.”

“Then come with me, please? Or at least take me as far as you can.” Ran turned suddenly pleading eyes on the blonde, lower lip caught between his teeth.

Yohji was taken aback by the sudden change in the arrogant young man and frowned. Schuldig would stake him out for monster bait if he didn’t follow his orders to the letter. “I can’t. I’m supposed to take you back to the beginning and that’s what I’ll do.”

“Just let me out. I’ll make my own way, then.”

“I can’t. It’s the gates or nothing,” Yohji told him, fidgeting slightly. 

Ran smiled internally. He had read the other man correctly. This guy was a total softy, despite his external appearance. He managed a faint quaver in his voice to match his suddenly quivering lip. “Please…. My, my sister….”

Absent-mindedly, Yohji pulled his pack of cigarettes from a pocket and fished one out, or tried to. He had forgotten that the pack was empty. He stared at it for a long moment, frustration mounting. “Damn it!”

‘Ah-HAH!’ Ran reached into his pocket and pulled out his father’s cigarettes and tapped the pack thoughtfully against his cheek. He had Yohji’s instant and almost undivided attention.

“Where did you get those?”

“We’re trying to convince my father to quit,” Ran informed him, watching Yohji’s eyes track every movement of the pack with carefully hope.

“Those are my brand,” Yohji muttered, practically salivating at the sight. Schuldig may have picked up his habit from the blonde, but he favored a much harsher blend of tobacco.

“Oh? Would you like them?” Ran offered, raising his eyebrows.

Yohji’s fingers had actually brushed the package before Ran jerked it away. Yohji repressed a snarl of frustration and looked down to see that all traces of the defenseless, pleading teenager had disappeared. The young man staring back at him had iron in the back of his gaze.

“I’ll give them to you if you’ll get me out of here and show me the way to the castle,” Ran promised. Smiling, he returned to tapping the almost full pack against one cheek.

“The Goblin King will gut me,” Yohji protested. He folded his arms and leaned back against the wall again. “No deal.”

His eyes, however, continued to follow the movement of the cigarettes.

“Oh. Too bad,” Ran shrugged and went to tuck the cigarettes back into his pocket. The movement was arrested by Yohji’s sudden grip on his wrist.

“Look, I’ll let you out and take you back to the gates.”

Ran twisted his wrist out of the older man’s grip. “It’s the castle or nothing.”

“You can follow me out of here,” Yohji offered. “That’s it. Take it or leave it.”

Ran withdrew two cigarettes and offered them. “For that, I’ll give you two. Now get me the hell out of here.”

“All of them.”

“Five. You want the whole pack, you’ll have to take me to the castle.”

“Five.”

Five were extended . “Get me out of here.”

He was forced to wait, however, as the first thing Yohji did was light up. Ignoring the redhead’s exaggerated coughing and waving motions, the blonde took a deep breath and smiled sleepily.

“Oh, that’s much better.”

“That’s totally a matter of opinion,” Ran said, wrinkling his nose. “Out?.”

“Certainly!” Yohji kicked aside a formless mass of brown fabric to reveal a door lying on the floor. He picked it up and rested it against what appeared to be a natural indentation in the wall. He twisted the ring that passed for a handle and pulled it open. There was a feminine scream, and a loofah bounced off his head.

Hastily slamming the door, Yohji looked over his shoulder to see Ran regarding him with some scorn and a raised eyebrow.

“Eh-heh.” Twisting the ring again, Yohji pulled the door open in the opposite direction, revealing a long, narrow passageway. “C’mon kid. Let’s get this over with before his Majesty figures out I just sold him down the river for a handful of cigarettes.”

**

Mamoru, still upside down, swore under his breath. There were goblins and then there were goblins. The misfits that crowded the Goblin City and the Castle were generally small and mostly harmless. Then there were the members of Schuldig’s guard.

The guards were larger than the average run of goblin, uglier too. They were stronger and meaner than the others and they tended to travel in packs. He was currently surrounded by four of them.

‘I am so very screwed.’

He concentrated on the hideous revenge which he would wreak on Schrient when he finally managed to work his way free of his bonds. The goblins wouldn’t hurt him too badly, they wouldn’t dare, but this was certainly not going to be any fun.

‘Damn you, Yohji. Where are you?!’

**

Yohji stalked down the dimly lit stone hallway, muttering around his cigarette. He should not be doing this. If Crawford found out, he’d rat Yohji out to Schuldig, and his punishment would be… severe.

Something about all of this was bothering him, but he couldn’t pin down exactly what. The kid’s sister was too old, really. The kid himself didn’t fit the normal type to end up wandering here. He was too determined, too focused. The teenager had also managed to get a hell of a long way toward the castle in a _very_ short time. To top it all off, the Labyrinth was acting weird.

“Where are you taking me?”

“Toward the castle,” Yohji told him. “Shut up and let me concentrate or the damn tunnel will end up feeding us back into the oubliette.”

“The what?” Ran asked, trotting along at his heels.

“Oubliette. It’s from the French. I’m sure you can figure out what it means.”

Ran swallowed, again wondering just what was going to happen to him if he failed. He followed obediently behind the older man, wondering again at the incongruity of his dress and mannerisms here in the fantasy that was the Labyrinth.

‘Sunglasses underground?’

Lost in thought, Ran leaped about a foot in the air when a deep voice suddenly rumbled, “Don’t go on!”

Yohji also started, but clapped both hands to his ears and winced. “Damn it all…. Not so fucking _loud_!”

There was no response. Ran looked around to see a stone face as tall as he was, carved into the wall. It rolled stone eyes toward him even as Yohji grabbed his wrist and continued to stalk down the passageway.

“Turn back while you still can!”

Ran caught this one with its lips still moving. Yohji let out a strangled whimper and increased his pace.

“What are they?” Ran asked him, trying to tug his arm free.

“False alarms,” Yohji told him, face twisted painfully.

“Are they dangerous?” Ran crowded slightly closer to Yohji, as if afraid one of the graven faces might grow arms and grab him.

Yohji winced again. “Only to my hangover.”


	9. Schuldig takes Ran and Yohji to Task

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Yohji regrets his knight-errantry and Ran shouts a lot.

Unconsciously echoing Crawford’s earlier actions, Schuldig rolled one of his crystals between his palms. He had finally managed to win his cloak back from the infuriating little girl, and had left her to play with some of her more esoteric winnings while he checked on the progress of her brother.

Several of the goblins had reappeared while they had been playing their game, and their King had set them to cleaning the throne room. Goblins were inherently messy creatures, and Schuldig maintained his pristine white wardrobe through a combination of magic and sheer bloody-mindedness.

Eventually tiring of her new toys, Aya abandoned them and came to sit at his feet,. She stared at the crystal with wide eyes. “What’s that?”

“It’s a number of different things,” he told her, hoping to head off another set of her endless questions before they began. “Just now I was using it to watch your brother.”

She noted his slight smile and asked, warily,“Where is he?”

“On his way to the castle yet again. He’s a very determined young man.”

“I thought you were going to send him back to the beginning?” Aya leaned against his knee and peered into the still-gently rolling crystal.

Schuldig laughed softly. “I’m playing a very complicated game. Would you like to watch?”

Aya nodded, holding out her hands. The Goblin King tossed the crystal lightly, and it sparkled as it landed neatly in her grasp. “Tell it what you’d like to see,” he told her, his smile widening.

“I want to see my brother,” she declared firmly.

After a moment or two, an image flickered in the depths of the crystal, Schuldig leaned over to watch, and his smile became predatory. “You do have a way with magic, child.”

Aya stared, fascinated, at the young man in the crystal. It was Ran, there was no doubt about that, but he was older. _Much_ older. He was dressed entirely in black, from his booted feet to the high collar of the shirt that peeked out from beneath his long, buckled coat. A single golden earring hung from one ear, and his expression was grim.

“What - what happened?” she asked, looking up to meet the Goblin King’s lazy smirk.

“You asked to see your brother,” he told her.

Aya frowned. She was beginning to become used to her strange captor’s odd tricks. She’d read or listened to all the same stories as her brother, after all, even if she’d understood fewer of the more complex twists. “I want to see my brother right _now_ ,” she demanded, staring again into the sparkling sphere.

**

Yohji slumped against a wall, wondering feverishly why the Labyrinth would produce alcohol when he really wanted it but never had anything as vital as, say, aspirin to offer. Just as he was beginning to relax, yet another booming voice spoke, this one almost directly beside his ear.

“This is not the way!”

Whimpering again, Yohji clapped both hands over his ears and sank to the floor of the tunnel. “Shutupshutupshup!” he demanded, wincing at his own volume.

Ran moved over to the large stone face and prodded at its nose.

“Stop that,” it told him, sounding somewhat startled.

“I’ll stop that if you guys will stop shouting,” Ran offered reasonably, poking again at the giant face.

“But it’s our job,” the face protested, rolling one carven eye nervously as Ran’s hand crept upward.

“So do it quietly,” Ran offered, fingers drifting to rest at one edge of the eye.

“Right,” it whispered. “We’ll – get right on that.”

Ran managed to pull Yohji to his feet and pushed him down the hallway.

“Beware! For the - ” began the next head. Ran pivoted and snarled at it, and it wisely shut up.

Half-supporting the much taller man Ran continued down the passageway. “Just great, I finally manage the fantasy setting of my dreams and it contains a psychotic riddler, a defective guide and shouting masonry.”

**

“Sweetheart?” Schuldig dropped to one knee beside Aya, who was watching her brother’s somewhat encumbered journey with fascination.

“Hmmmm?”

“I think I need to have a little talk with your brother’s friend there. I want you to stay right here, all right?”

Aya looked up and smiled. “All right.”

Schuldig smiled back. “And if you try to leave the castle, I’ll turn your brother into one of those faces.”

The little girl lost her smile and glared at him. “That’s -”

“Not fair. I know.” He pulled gently on one of her braids, smiled again and vanished.

Aya turned back to the events in the crystal with a sullen pout. “It _isn’t_ fair,” she muttered, sounding remarkably like her brother.

**

Farfarello asked again, “Do you understand?”

Hel sniffed, rubbing absently at what appeared to be the beginning of a truly marvelous black eye. “Frighten him, slow him down and keep him away from the path. A child could do it.”

All eyes turned almost involuntarily to the small form of Tot, who was watching Schoen carefully stitch her stuffed rabbit back together. Someone had apparently ripped one of its arms off. Farfarello smiled. He could guess who it had been. Neu was lying on the ground, one leg elevated and what looked to be several damp cloths wrapped around it.

Schrient had been playing again, and probably with the Takatori brat. For being so young, the boy could generally hold his own. That meant that he was probably either tending his own wounds, or they had trapped him somewhere; probably the former. Young Mamoru was difficult prey to pin down.

“The four of you would do better to cease playing with the other guardians and stick instead to your assigned tasks.” Farfarello, however amused by their in-fighting, was not enjoying further signs that order was not being maintained.

“That’s rich, coming from you.” Neu scowled at him, shoving her sunglasses up into her hair. “You’re the one we’re usually sent scurrying through the underbrush to _find_.”

Hel made a ‘shhhh’ motion behind Farfarello’s back. They both ignored her.

“Do as you’re told.” Farfarello said flatly. He gestured to each of the women. “You have your orders, and you’ll follow them.”

“Like you do?” Neu rolled her eyes. “We’re not supposed to directly interfere with any of the Goblin King’s games. You know that. You’re basically telling us to obey your orders to _disobey_.”

“He’s not allowed to interfere. I don’t have any such restrictions and now, neither do you.”

Schoen stopped her work on the stuffed toy and even Tot stared at Farfarello, eyes wide.

“The Goblin King is going to set fire to you, Farfarello.”

Farfarello shrugged. “He would have to find out, first.” He smiled, again making eye contact with each woman. “And that’s not going to happen.”

Uneasily, Hel moved carefully away from Neu’s defiant confrontation with the Goblin King’s unstable favorite. “No, it’s not. _Is it_?”

Neu gave Farfarello a narrow-eyed look, but didn’t respond.

“Keep him away from the castle.” Farfarello had no hesitation in turning his back on the quartet. However dangerous they were, they would not risk launching an attack on him.

That did not make their silent acceptance of his orders any less resentful.

**

Ran continued to support Yohji as they made their way down the tunnel. The various false alarms had apparently given up on dramatic volume and were trying for menacing whispers.

“Take heed and go no further.”

Rolling his eyes, the teenager blew out a frustrated breath. “It wouldn’t kill you to walk on your own.”

”I have a _headache_ ,” the blonde hissed, reluctantly straightening.

“Whatever. Can we please just get out of here? Before I’m old enough to vote?”

Yohji turned to make a blistering retort, and merely succeeding in turning a rather unbecoming shade of green. Ran blinked, and glanced back over his shoulder.

Leaning casually against the wall behind them was the Goblin King. He was still dressed in white leather, although now his shirt was ruffled and the short jacket had become a long coat, almost brushing the heels of his long boots. Despite the fact that they were still far underground, Schuldig appeared to be standing in a pool of sunlight.

Ran was an actor and could admire both the effect and its impact. That did not make him happy to see the man. “You!”

“Me.” Schuldig smirked and pushed away from the wall. “What are you doing here, Kudou?”

“This is your fault,” the blonde hissed angrily, beginning to recover from the sudden shock of having been caught out by the Goblin King.

“Hmmmmm,” Schuldig responded thoughtfully, pacing in a circle around them. “Where are you taking this boy?”

“To the gates,” Yohji responded promptly, praying silently that Ran would be intelligent enough to take the hint.

Ran stepped on his foot, hard, and gave him a dirty look. Yohji bit his lip, but managed not to shout in pain. It didn’t help. Schuldig had seen the entire exchange and was smiling maliciously at them both.

“Really. And where did you get _these_?” Long fingers rested on the remaining cigarettes where Yohji had folded them into one of the short pseudo-sleeves of his shirt.

“Ah. Those. Erm,” Yojhi began, fumbling for a good lie as he backed slowly away.

Schuldig moved faster, darting forward in a swirl of white leather and twisting one of Yohji’s arms up behind his back. “You wouldn’t be disobeying a direct order, would you?”

Yohji closed his eyes and prayed for mercy even as pain shot up his arm. He had been here in the Labyrinth longer than any of the others and had years of experience in dealing with the mercurial Goblin King. Like Farfarello, he got away with a lot, partly because he was a novelty and partly because Schuldig was genuinely fond of him.

But fondness only goes so far.

“The gates,” he repeated grimly, knowing that Schuldig recognized the lie even as he spoke it. “I was taking him to the gates.”

“If I believed for one instant that you were truly intending to stab me in the back, you would be spending the rest of your life regretting it,” Schuldig purred, again tightening his grip.

Yohji gasped, wondering if he was going to end up with a dislocated shoulder. Schuldig knew that he was lying and had just laid out the penalty if he were caught doing so again. Regret? Yohji shuddered involuntarily. That wasn’t an idle threat. He’d rather have his arm ripped off.

The Goblin King held him for another minute or two before suddenly releasing him and turning to smile down at Ran. “And how are you enjoying my Labyrinth?”

The teenager stared up into those laughing eyes and that mocking smile. He had seen Yohji kill four men just a few hours ago without so much as breaking a sweat. The blond was currently leaning against one of the walls, cradling his arm and staring blankly at the floor. Ran was learning to fear the Goblin King, and it was not an experience that he was enjoying. His temper came to his r escue, and Ran drew anger around him like protective armor. He met that cruelly amused gaze and spoke possibly the most unwise phrase of his entire life.

“It’s a piece of cake.”

Yohji jerked his head up and stared in disbelief at the boy. Ran’s chin was up and his eyes were glittering with anger as he met the Goblin King’s gaze. Schuldig gave a bark of startled laughter and his smile broadened. “Is it?”

Ran wanted to back away as Schuldig suddenly leaned even closer, his voice soft and purring. “Let’s make this interesting then, shall we?”

He’d known it was a mistake the moment he’d opened his mouth, and Ran swallowed hard. He kept his bravado, however, not blinking or looking away. “This isn’t interesting enough? Kidnapping and torment and stupid riddles and, and whatever this is?”

“Apparently not.” Schuldig smiled. “As you’re doing so well, and finding all of ‘this’ so easy – you won’t be needing the full thirteen hours. From here… I’ll give you another _six_.”

“That’s not fair!” Ran shouted.

Yohji clapped his hands over his ears again, and Schuldig’s face darkened. The Goblin King’s voice was deceptively calm as he once again loomed over the teen. “Nothing is fair.”

Ran watched, face anguished, as Schuldig turned again and strode away. “Aya,” he whispered.

The Goblin King turned and looked back over his shoulder. “So. Disobeying orders, Kudou?”

Yohji straightened abruptly. Schuldig was about to do something nasty. Really nasty. He knew the signs. Yohji lunged, grabbing Ran’s arm and tugging him to one side of the tunnel. Schuldig smiled cruelly and produced another one of those damn crystals.

He _hated_ those fucking things.

“A reminder, then. Don’t cross me again.” Turning, he hurled it down the tunnel, stepping backward and disappearing in another flare of white leather. An ominous creaking and grinding began from the direction in which the crystal had disappeared.

Yohji cursed and tightened his grip on the younger man. “Shit. Shut up and run.”

“Wait - what?” Ran asked, confused. He resisted Yohji’s pull, trying to make out the source of the noise. There was a final crash and thud, and Yohji grabbed him and _yanked_.

“Just shut up and _run_!”

**

Aya watched in horrified fascination as her brother and his strange friend raced down the tunnel, moving as quickly as they could. Behind them, illuminated by the sunlight creeping through the occasional grating, came a shape that – she couldn’t quite make it out, but it moved _fast_ , and low to the ground and it made her skin crawl.

“Ran!”

She was jerked out of her contemplation by a pair of arms wrapping themselves around her and hoisting her into the air. She let out a little shriek of surprise and clutched convulsively at the crystal.

“Don’t worry about him, sweetheart. I have infinite faith in his stubbornness and Kudou’s resourcefulness.” Schuldig swung her around and set her down on the edge of his low-backed ‘throne’.

“That was mean!” she shouted, stung almost to tears.

He shrugged carelessly, sinking to his heels in front of her. “I don’t think that there’s anything to worry about.” He reached out and unfolded her hands from around the crystal.

Unbidden, she stared again at the fleeing men, starting to cry softly as the pursuing shape slithered and undulated closer.

**

They sprinted down the tunnel, dodging the occasional gigantic cobweb and leaping over rubble that had probably once been doors blocking the passage.

“Way to go, kid. I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone piss him off so badly,” Yohji snapped, hangover forgotten in a mad rush of adrenaline.

“How the hell was I supposed to know what he’d do?” Ran protested angrily.

“The guy steals babies and turns them into goblins! What did you think he’d be like?!”

They ran frantically down the tunnel, searching for any sort of side hallway or forking of the passageway. There was nothing. They fled for what seemed like forever, fighting to keep both their feet and their breath, until they fetched up in front of a set of locked iron gates.

“We’re going to die.” Yohji shook the gates frantically, wincing at the pain that shot up his arm.

“We’re not going to die,” Ran gritted out. He looked frantically to the left and right. “I refuse to let him get the better of me!”

“What sort of fantasy world do you _live_ in, kid?”

Ran ignored him. To their right was a set of wooden doors, set flush with the wall and covered with so many layers of dust and cobwebs that they had fled straight past it the first time. “Over here.”

**

Aya’s breath caught in her throat as her brother began kicking at the door. His companion joined him and the two young men beat frantically at the ancient wooden barrier as the shadowy creature moved inexorably down the tunnel toward them.

“Oh please, please…,” she whispered.

Apparently the gods were favorably disposed, for just as the furthest stretching coil of blackness would have caught itself in Yohji’s rather indecently tight clothing, the doors fell in, and the two fugitives fell with it.

Sprawled just out of harm’s way, they scrambled to their feet and backed away from the still-approaching blackness. The iron gates that had blocked their way swung open – and sealed them in, holding the undulating darkness at bay.

Aya dropped the crystal then and sank her face in her tiny hands, sobbing with a mixture of terror and relief. Arms wrapped around her and, desperate for comfort, she leaned into the embrace. Schuldig looked down at the little girl in his arms and sighed.

“You’re going to have to learn to trust me, sweetheart. The game isn’t over yet.” He drew her fully into his arms and rose to his feet, cradling her against his chest as he moved toward the window. He settled himself in the sill, allowing the little girl to recline against him, sobbing bitterly into the white leather of his coat.

Schuldig beckoned, and the discarded crystal reappeared in his hand. He turned it slightly, catching the light, and brought again the picture of the older, black-clad Fujimiya Ran into view.

“The game isn’t over yet,” he repeated softly, and his smile was filled with anticipation.


	10. Out of the Mouths of Babes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In Which Nagi Waxes Sarcastic

Farfarello let himself into the throne room, threading his way among the shadows. The ‘throne’ was empty, Schuldig’s long jacket flung across it. The room was cleaner than the last time he’d been here, the walls and columns practically gleaming, the floor polished to a shine. The various toys and scraps that normally littered the place had all been cleared away, save a small heap left directly beneath Schuldig’s low chair, half-concealed by the folds of white leather.

“Over here.” Schuldig’s voice drifted softly from the direction of one of the windows and Farfarello joined him there.

Looking down disapprovingly at the little girl in the Goblin King’s arms, the scarred man leaned against the wall. “Well?”

“You were right,” Schuldig admitted softly. “She’ll never be a goblin. I don’t think she’d manage well out in the Labyrinth either.”

“What will you do? The game has certain rules and if you break them you risk ruin for us all.” Farfarello fiddled with one of his ever-present knives, staring implacably down at Schuldig.

The Goblin King laughed, careful to keep his voice low enough that it would not wake the now-sleeping child. “You do keep me humble, don’t you?”

“I try. He made it as far as the oubliette. What are you going to do?”

“Oh, he’s well past the oubliette now,” Schuldig informed him lazily. “He’s on the edge of Mamoru’s turf at the moment.”

“He’s _what_?” Farfarello hissed. “What are you going to do if he makes it all the way to the castle?”

“Are you afraid, Far?”

“Yes, and if you had any sense, you would be too. For all of your grandiose claims, This _isn’t_ a game.”

The Goblin King turned his head slightly and a single golden eye met frosted blue. “What makes you think that it isn’t, or even that you know which game it is?”

Farfarello swallowed, reminded for the first time in years of the raw power wielded by the youthful –looking creature in the window. He remembered the fear and the pain of his own ‘game’ with the Goblin King. He remembered buying his sister’s freedom with his soul; allowed power and free will because the Goblin King found him ‘interesting’. He could have ended up like Schrient, chained to a small stretch of the Labyrinth and forced to follow orders. He could have ended up like Mamoru, drained of even the memory of who he was or what had led him to this place.

“Nothing is as it seems,” Schuldig reminded him, cold iron in the back of that soft voice. “Take nothing for granted.”

“Forgive me,” the white-haired man whispered, dropping to one knee. “I had forgotten.”

“Do not let it happen again,” Schuldig ordered him. A smile crept across those thin lips, and he tilted his head to one side. “I will have need of you shortly, but for the moment I think that Crawford would benefit from your aid. Go to him.”

Farfarello rose to his feet and turned to leave, only to feel long fingers wrapping around his wrist. He froze, waiting to hear what else the Goblin King had to tell him.

“Be careful of the boy,” Schuldig was frowning. “I have… plans for him.”

**

Yohji kept his back resolutely to the shattered doors and looked around the alcove sheltering them from the creature still attempting to wind its way through the iron gate. Ran followed suit, brushing futilely at the wooden splinters embedded in his jeans.

“Now what?” 

“Now we go up.” Yohji moved to the side of the small room and indicated a metal ladder. It had been bolted to the wall and went up as far as Ran could see in the limited light.

Ran sighed, still feeling his earlier bruises and now a set of fresh, new ones. “Up it is.”

They were both doing their best to ignore the sounds behind them, but they moved as quickly as possible up the ladder. Yohji made Ran precede him up the ladder, claiming that he didn’t trust the boy at his back. Ran knew better. He glanced down once or twice to see the blond carefully making his way up the ladder one-handed, struggling without complaint.

“Why did you let him hurt you?” Ran finally asked.

“What makes you think I had a choice?” Yohji responded bitterly.

Ran blinked. “I saw what you did to those men outside the Labyrinth.”

“You _are_ naïve,” Yohji sighed. “Schuldig is the Goblin King. He is the  
Labyrinth in some ways, or at least he’s an extension of it. Or it is of him. I can never remember. If I’d struck at him, or even struggled, he would have broken my arm and dropped me in the Bog. If I were very lucky.”

Something inside Ran was deeply offended by this. “So if you hadn’t let him hurt you, he would have hurt you more? That’s not fair!”

“Kid, you’ve got a lot to learn. I owe Schuldig for the very air I breathe. He _owns_ me.”

“That doesn’t give him the right to hurt you,” Ran snapped.

“Schuldig isn’t unnecessarily cruel. He doesn’t like to hurt me, in fact I can’t remember the last time he did something like that to me.” Yohji’s lips twisted a little at the lie. It had been a very long time ago, but he remembered it vividly. The Goblin King believed in object lessons, and he made sure that they were memorable. He sighed. “It doesn’t really matter. I knew what his reaction would be when I agreed to help you. I should have known better.”

“Maybe you should quit smoking.”

Yohji didn’t say anything to that. He suspected that Ran was feeling guilty about his own role in Yohji’s punishment. For a brief moment, he found himself wanting to give the kid a hand. His shoulder twinged painfully, and he forced the impulse down. Schuldig did not believe in second chances, and if he gave the boy any more help the consequences would be severe.

“What’s the Bog?” Ran asked.

“It’s the nastiest place in the world,” Yohji said. “Touch the surface, and you’ll smell bad for all eternity. Even your grave will stink. It’s like an open cesspit, and the smell is enough to make you vomit.”

Ran decided not to ask any more questions.

**

Ken leaned against the trunk of a particularly large tree and prodded moodily at the ground with a stick.

He’d been stuck here for hours and was bored, hungry, and in need of a nap. The day dragged on, as they always did. Night rarely came to the Labyrinth, unless Schuldig was feeling particularly dramatic or in a very bad mood. Time hung somewhere around twilight or, occasionally, dawn.

Just another weird quirk that made it hard to tell anything about the passing time. 

Ken found it annoying, but had ceased to question it. That didn’t mean he couldn’t recognize and appreciate its effect on his restlessness and boredom.

If the surface of the Bog weren’t so _thick_ he might’ve tried skipping stones.

**

Schuldig remained seated quietly in the window, one arm wrapped around the slumbering girl. He amused himself as he waited by looking again at the picture of the older Ran, a slight smile on his face. Finally tiring of examining the contrasts, he whispered, “Show me Yohji.”

Unlike Ran, the image that formed in the crystal showed few real changes in the blonde. The hair, the clothing, the sunglasses, the cigarette…. Schuldig’s eyebrows shot upward. The tattoo, now _that_ was new. He frowned slightly and let the image expand.

“Well, well, well.” The Goblin King frowned slightly. “That’s interesting. What could I have been thinking?”

He continued to watch the scene in the crystal, slowly becoming absorbed in the events that played out in miniature before his eyes. After half an hour, he let the crystal disappear and settled himself a bit more firmly against the window sill, gently shifting Aya’s weight.

“Well, that’s a complication I hadn’t thought of,” he told the top of her head. “But I think I can work with it.” A slow, wicked smile appeared, and he rested his cheek against her hair, staring out at the endless corridors of the Labyrinth..

“In fact, this might solve my little problem with boredom once and for all.”

**

Nagi had spent his morning blissfully unaware of the conflicts and changes taking place in the other sections of the Labyrinth. He had not been in the Labyrinth very long, especially when compared to Yohji, Mamoru or Farfarello. It had taken him a great deal longer than the others to really settle in and adjust to this new place.

The Goblin King had made him one of the Labyrinth’s guardians, but had left the boy mostly to his own devices. Time passed strangely in the Underground, but Nagi knew that he had been here for months, if not years, and that Schuldig had given him power. He had finally realized that his past would not suddenly reappear to swallow him whole, and had begun to figure out the limits both of his power and his strange new role.

As a result, he spent most of his days wandering the massive hedge maze that made up his area of responsibility. Nagi spoke to the creatures that lived here, tried to understand them and work out what his duties were. Today he had encountered someone he was familiar with, an old, half-blind fortune-teller with whiskers and a strange, animalistic face.

The strange pair had been wandering through the maze all morning, the elderly fortune-teller mumbling about this and that while Nagi kept him company, nodding at appropriate moments and making encouraging sounds. He found the old creature’s company to be strangely soothing, and looked forward to another lazy, uneventful afternoon.

**

Finally, after what seemed like an eternity of climbing, Ran reached the top of the ladder. “Please tell me this isn’t a dead end,” he muttered.

“It isn’t,” Yohji reassured him. “Just push.”

Ran did so, feeling the stone above him shift slightly. “I can’t get it to move.”

“Oh hell,” Yohji nudged Ran’s foot with his head. “Shove over and I’ll give you a hand.

The younger man did so, and between the two of them, they managed to shove the heavy obstacle to one side. There was a tremendous crash, and Ran poked his head out to see where they had ended up.

They had popped out of what looked like a large stone jar. It was standing in the middle of a paved courtyard surrounded by tall hedges. As he gaped at their changed surroundings, Yohji freed himself from the jar with a twist and a wiggle and dropped to the ground.

“Okay kid, this is as far as I go.”

“Say what?” Ran leaped from the jar himself, landing somewhat awkwardly in front of Yohji.

“Look, I got off lucky the first time. You’re a hell of a lot closer than when I picked you up. The castle is _that_ way. Have fun!”

“You’re just going to abandon me? You’re going to let him treat you like that and then just… go with it? Aren’t we supposed to be allies now, or friends or… something?

“Friends?” Yohji paused, as though the concept were an utterly foreign one. In a way, it was. You didn’t have ‘friends’ in the Labyrinth.

“Yeah, you know, shared peril and all,” Ran muttered, looking down at his feet.

“Peril which was your fault,” Yohji snapped, regaining his resolve. “You’re thinking that this is a _story_ again. This is reality. You’re just visiting, or so you think, but I actually have to _live_ here.”

“You can’t just leave me,” Ran protested, eyes wide and anguished.

Yohji gave him a distinctly cynical up and down. “Don’t pull that shit on me again, kid. I don’t care how adorable and defenseless you look. You’re quite the piece of work, you know?”

Ran scowled as Yohji pulled out another cigarette and lit up. “How can you live with yourself, abandoning a little girl to her fate?”

“I’ll find a way,” Yohji reassured him. “At least this way I won’t end up - never mind. Go find your sister.”

“Fine!”

“What’s all the shouting about?” a quavering voice inquired.

Both young men turned quickly to find a strange looking creature standing almost directly behind them. It had long white whiskers, a vacant expression and flowing robes.

“My _friend_ ,” Ran told the creature with the vaguely canine appearance, “and I were just wondering which route was the best one to the center of the Labyrinth.”

The elderly beast stroked its whiskers and wandered slowly off to a nearby bench and laboriously seated itself. “Hmmmmmm.”

Yohji rolled his eyes, and then stopped. The new arrival wasn’t alone. Hugging the creature like a shadow was someone else. Stepping quickly to the left, he closed in on the beast, which was still mumbling under its breath.

“Nagi?”

Nagi glanced at Yohji before focusing his attention again on the redhead standing before the fortune-teller. “Who is he?”

Yohji considered his answer carefully. Nagi was youngest of the guardians, also the most badly damaged. He was lucky the boy hadn’t slammed him into a wall for revealing his presence to the stranger.

“Just a kid looking for his sister. His name’s Ran, I think.”

“Are you supposed to be helping him?” The look Nagi turned on him this time was mildly accusing.

“No, and I’ve already had a little chat with our illustrious lord and master on that subject, thanks.”

Ran, who had been regarding the fortune-teller somewhat impatiently, asked “Now what?”

Nagi frowned at him, pulling further away. His voice was still soft as he answered. “Nothing is for free in the Labyrinth. Give him something for his answer.”

Blowing out a frustrated breath, Ran went through his pockets again. “I haven’t got much of anything.”

Yohji looked at the meager collection. “Give him the bus pass, kid. It’ll be the only one in the Labyrinth.”

Casting a dubious look at the blond, Ran handed the brightly colored slip of paper to the beast, who looked at it blankly and went back to his mumbling.

“Well?”

Nagi glared at him from his position of partial concealment behind the bulk of the fortune-teller. “Impatient, aren’t we? That’ll certainly help the situation.”

Yohji snorted. “Oh, you have no idea. The kid’s got one hell of a mouth on him. Schuldig had us _both_ chased down the tunnels.”

“Your life choices,” Nagi sighed. “The Goblin King just loves defiance.”

“Sometimes,” Yohji murmured, giving the boy a twisted grin.

Nagi made a face. “I don’t want to know.”

“The way forward,” interrupted the fortune-teller, “is sometimes the way back.”

All three young men stared at him.

“That’s it?” Ran demanded.

“For a bus pass that you can’t use anyway, I’d say it was a bargain,” Nagi informed him. “Didn’t Yohji say something about your having a sister to rescue?”

Ran glared at him.

“That would be my cue,” Yohji murmured. He turned and headed toward a nearby gap in the tall hedge.

”Hey!” Ran protested. “You can’t just leave me here! I thought - ”

Yohji paused, hearing again that strange note of indecision in the normally arrogant voice.

Nagi looked from one to the other, leaning against the bench and beginning to smile. “Oh ho… does the Goblin King know that you two have become so close?”

“Shut _up_ , Nagi,” Yohji snapped.

The boy flinched a little, and Yohji regretted his instinctive reaction. Nagi wasn’t very good with stressful situations, and it was generally understood that shouting at or upsetting the boy would bring the wrath of Schuldig down on your head. That’s if Nagi didn’t send you through a wall first.

”I’m sorry, Nagi.” Yohji tried to make his voice soothing as he apologized. “Schuldig is already unhappy with me about this. He wouldn’t like it if he found out that we were -”

“Friends,” Ran finished for him. The teenager had caught up with him and was giving him that utterly false ‘I’m so innocent and defenseless’ look.

“Which we’re _not_!” Yohji snarled, resolve hardening. “Hang onto him, Nagi. I’ve got things to do.”

Ran watched helplessly as Yohji disappeared into the gap, suddenly unable to move. “Damn it!”

Nagi shrugged. “Nothing is quite what it seems here, you know? I’m sure _that's_ news.”

“What do I do?”

Nagi shrugged again, vanishing behind the fortune-teller entirely. “Go on, I suppose. Good luck.”

Ran shivered as he felt the invisible pressure that had been holding him in place relax. “I… thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

**

Farfarello caught up with Crawford on the edge of one of the cliffs overlooking the darker portion of the Labyrinth.

“What the hell is he playing at?” 

Uncharacteristically, Farfarello hesitated over his response. “I… I don’t know.”

Crawford’s frown intensified. “What does that mean?”

“It means that he’s up to something,” Farfarello shrugged. “He sent me to  
give you a hand, which means that he knows what we’re up to and doesn’t care.”

“That is not a good thing,” Crawford noted dryly. “He nearly wrenched Kudou’s shoulder out of its socket earlier, and that was for a relatively minor offense. He doesn’t usually lay hands on Kudou.”

“Not violently, anyway.”

Crawford gave him a disapproving look.

“He’s wound up over something,” Farfarello agreed. “Keep your eyes open.”


	11. Easy Come, Easy Go

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In Which Yohji takes a Hike and Mamoru falls out of a Tree.

Yohji stomped angrily through the hedges, gritting his teeth at the pain which shot down his arm with each jarring step. He was too angry to slow down, however, and proceeded grimly onward.

Goddamn it, it just wasn’t fair! Schuldig was screwing around again, and somehow, as usual, he ended up taking it in the neck. Or shoulder, as the case may be. What the hell was he thinking? The girl was too old, the boy was too young, he was trying to change the rules in the middle and nothing was making any _sense_.

“You’d think he was setting himself up to lose!” Yohji stormed around a corner to find himself in a dead end. He stared at the tall hedges for a long moment. “What the hell?”

While the Labyrinth moved and twisted to a will of its own, there was one constant in the turns and weavings of the paths. Yohji _never_ ended up in a dead end. Ever. The Labyrinth _liked_ Yohji. Frowning, the tall blonde turned to retrace his steps, only to find that the hedges had silently shifted closed behind him.

“Shit.”

There were two possibilities here. One, that Yohji had somehow managed to piss off the Labyrinth itself. Unlikely. On the rare occasions that he screwed up somehow, he knew, because every path he took would force him to trek through the middle of the Bog of Eternal Stench. _Every_ path. 

The second possibility made his blood run cold, and he took a step backward.

This turned out to be a tactical error, as he jarred his injured shoulder against someone standing directly behind him. Gasping with the unexpected pain, Yohji whirled to find himself staring directly at a familiar fall of flame-bright hair.

“Don’t you ever look where you’re going, Kudou?”

‘Shit.’

**

Ran hesitated in the center of the courtyard, biting his lip as he looked at the various exits. The fortune teller had fallen asleep and was snoring gently. Nagi had taken up a stance leaning on the gigantic jar that Yohji and Ran had climbed out of in order to arrive here, keeping the bulk of it between Ran and himself. Ran chose to ignore the rather mind-bending fact that the jar was sitting on a small stone table…and that there was nothing underneath.

Looking over at the younger boy, Ran asked, “If I’m trying to find the fastest route to the castle, which path would serve me best?”

“The castle isn’t a very pleasant place.” Nagi disappeared behind the jar, reappearing to peer around it. “Why not just let it go? The Labyrinth isn’t so bad.”

“I just had a creeping thing try to _eat_ me!”

“If you stayed, they wouldn’t bother you,” Nagi said. “The Goblin King isn’t any safer, and the castle is worse.”

“Worse?” Ran shivered. “He’s got my little sister.”

“It could be worse.” Nagi gave him a very faint, almost shy smile. “The fastest route to the castle would probably be the one on your left. It changes, you see.”

“Thank you,” Ran told him again. Straightening his shoulders and taking a deep breath, he started forward.

From behind him, he heard a faint chuckle and so softly that he might almost have imagined it, “Good luck.”

**

Crawford scowled as he stared down at the sprawl of stone and vegetation that was the Labyrinth. You could never actually catch the thing moving, but every time he looked away the damn paths shifted. The Labyrinth was changing much more quickly than usual, showing a different layout of serpentine paths every time he checked.

“It’s Schuldig,” Farfarello told him, correctly divining the source of Crawford’s frustration. “He’s actively working on the thing. It’s the first time in years that I’ve seen him do this.”

“Then Kudou’s trouble earlier?”

Farfarello snorted. “If Yohji was having problems, it was because the Labyrinth was trying to tell him something. He hasn’t had any problems since -”

Crawford looked questioningly at the scarred killer as his voice faded away into thoughtful silence. “’Since’?”

“It was a long time ago,” Farfarello told him absently. “I don’t think that… no. Not after all this time.”

“I _hate_ it when you do that.”

Farfarello shrugged.

**

Yohji took a quick, stumbling step away from the Goblin King. “Schuldig! I - I was just on my way back to the main gates.”

Long fingered hands closed around his wrists, and Yohji couldn’t help wincing at the contact. “Tsk, your shoulder still bothering you?”

Yohji bit down on the immediate, bitter response and held very still. Schuldig took this silence as agreement and slid one hand up to Yohji’s shoulder. The taller man closed his eyes as the pain suddenly disappeared.

“I want you to stay away from that boy,” Schuldig told him gently, sliding his hand back down the Yohji’s bare arm to close again around his wrist. “I want you to go straight to the main gates and pause for _nothing_ along the way, do you understand me?”

Keeping his eyes tightly closed, Yohji nodded. He waited, but the hands did not release their grip. “I understand,” he managed.

“Look at me, Yohji.”

It was a command, and he reluctantly obeyed. He met the blazing eyes of the Goblin King without flinching, but it took a great deal of effort. Things hadn’t always been this way between them.

“You belong to me, body and soul, remember? You sold yourself to me in return for sanctuary and a chance to heal. You wished yourself on me, and I accepted you. You are mine, unconditionally.” Schuldig’s voice was almost savage, and the teasing note from before had disappeared entirely.

“I remember,” Yohji agreed softly. It was this exact thing that Schuldig had punished him for the last time, and the reason why the Labyrinth would not allow him to cross the borders of Schrient’s territory and why Schrient themselves could no longer move beyond that same boundary. Not that wild horses could have dragged him back after his first accidental visit. He’d had several months of brutal nightmares after that, and was content to stay as far from the psychotic foursome as possible.

Schuldig had never forgiven them, not for what Neu had said, not for his response and definitely not for the nightmares. The Goblin King had worked long and hard at eradicating those the first time and had been less than pleased by their return.

“Say it,” Schuldig demanded, finally releasing his wrists and stepping away.

Yohji dropped to one knee, a pose only he and Farfarello used when addressing the Goblin King. “To you and you alone I give my oath and allegiance, your Majesty.”

“See that you remember that,” Schuldig told him, eyes narrowing. “Unless and until I tell you otherwise, you are to go to the gates and remain there. Have I made myself clear?”

“Yes.” Yohji fixed his eyes on the ground and fought to keep a calm expression on his face. When he finally looked up, Schuldig was gone.

‘I hate this. I hate this more than I can say.’ Yohji got to his feet, the pain in his shoulder now nothing but a memory. He looked around, and the dead end had become just another section of the maze. With a grimace, he started forward. ‘Whatever he’s playing at, I hope he falls on his arrogant face.’

A soft ‘thump’ caught his attention, and he glanced to the side. There was a large bottle sitting to one side of the path, and Yohji caught it up without breaking stride. Getting drunk suddenly sounded like an excellent idea.

**

Mamoru was holding his own against the small squad of goblins, but only barely. There were four of the little monsters, and each was armed with a long pike. However, instead of metal or stone tips, the ends of the pikes bore small monsters with very long, sharp teeth.

“I’m _supposed_ to be here, you horrible little – Ow!” Mamoru fended off another attempt. “I’m not an intruder, would you cut that out?”

Luckily, not only did the goblins have terrible aim, the little monsters were blind and oftimes were knocked into the wildly flailing guardian backward, unable to bite him. Mamoru had managed to get in a few good swings, knocking at least one of the goblins flying and forcing another to let go of his pike altogether.

At the moment, they were at a stalemate. Mamoru couldn’t reach the pike beneath him, but neither could they. He felt dizzy from having been upside down for so long, but was still firmly enmeshed in his bonds. He swore under his breath, wishing fervently that he had his weapons. He could actually see them from where he hung, lying halfway under one of the hedges where Schoen had carelessly tossed them after Hel knocked him flying. They were lying right next to that shoe -

Mamoru moved his eyes upward, downward -. He closed his eyes for a moment to fight the mild nausea from being so long upside down. Opening them again, he followed the line of the leg that was in the shoe until it connected with a body and from there to the face. It wasn’t Yohji, but a stranger not much older than Mamoru. He was watching the fracas with a look of mild shock.

Not wanting to divert the guard’s attention to the new arrival, Mamoru tried to think of some way to get him to look down. Surely if he noticed the darts lying at his feet he would be able to use them to frighten the goblins away.

Said goblins seized this moment of distraction and pounced. Mamoru squawked, and thrashed about, managing to knock one of the goblins headlong into another. In their collision, the two creatures managed to knock their helms sideways, and thus were suddenly blinded. Swinging wildly at the end of his rope, Mamoru heard a sort of twanking, metallic noise. On his next swing, he caught sight of the stranger again. The other boy had one of his darts and was taking careful aim at another of the goblins. There was a repetition of that strange noise, and Mamoru realized it must be the noise of his darts striking goblin armor.

There was a great deal of confused clanking and screaming as the blinded goblins proceeded to accidentally attack their comrades, eventually chasing each other off into the Labyrinth, leaving Mamoru alone with the stranger.

“Are you all right?”

“I’d be better if you could get me down from here,” Mamoru told him. “I’ve been upside down for so long that I’m beginning to forget what things look like when they’re the right way up. My name is Mamoru, by the way.”

“I’m Ran,” the stranger told him. He moved around the suspended boy and examined the rope where it had been tied to the tree. “I think I can get you down, but this might hurt just a little.”

“I don’t care,” Mamoru moaned. “I just want to get down.”

With a swift tug, Ran loosened the knot holding the other boy suspended, and Mamoru crashed to the ground.

“Owwwwwww,” Mamoru moaned.

“Sorry,” Ran told him, moving to help him to his feet. “Are you hurt?”

“I’ve felt better,” the boy admitted, struggling out of his bonds. “Thanks for the rescue.”

The redhead shrugged, apparently embarrassed. “You’re welcome. I’m on my way to the castle, and -”

“The castle?” Mamoru paused, startled. “Are you sure that’s such a good idea?”

Ran shrugged again. “I haven’t really got any choice."

Holding his hand out for his darts, the other boy grinned. “Well, it’ll be a long walk. You can tell me all about it as we go.”

“You’re willing to go with me? You know the way?” Ran gave him a suspicious look.

Mamoru shrugged. “You rescued me. Why not? You’re not going to have much luck on your own, after all. The Labyrinth doesn’t make it easy for anyone, and at least I know where we’re going.”

“No one’s going to … pop up and make death threats and sic monsters on us?”

“Ah. The Goblin King’s been paying you visits?” Mamoru made a face. “This is _his_ Labyrinth, after all, but he doesn’t often make personal appearances. How did you get in here? How did you get so _far_?’

“I – can we talk while we walk? I don’t know how much time I have left.” Ran held up his arm, showing his broken watch.

“Which answers my first question.” Mamoru sighed. “This way.”

**

Yohji stalked along, smoking one of the cigarettes Ran had given him and pausing every so often for a swig from his bottle. He should have managed to leave the hedge maze almost ten minutes ago, but the path seemed particularly winding today.

He tried not to think about it. As long as he kept heading for the gate, nothing bad would happen.

Probably.

‘I hate this. I really, really hate this.’

**

Aya woke up and stretched, dislodging the long coat which had been draped over her as a sort of blanket. She had apparently been sleeping curled up on Schuldig’s throne. She glanced around the throne room, and caught sight of the Goblin King, perched once again in one of the tall windows. She hopped off of the throne and made her way across the room toward him.

“Where is my brother?” she asked him warily.

He looked down at her, his expression somewhere between angry and unhappy. “What? Oh. He’s about to enter the forest. Would you like to watch, sweetheart?”

She hesitated, remembering what she had seen the last time she had looked in on her brother’s adventure. Aya knew what he was now, at least in the terms of the stories _she_ knew. 

“I can’t trust you.”

“I knew you were a smart girl.” Schuldig shifted in the window, staring down at her thoughtfully. “Trust isn’t something you should give to just anyone.”

“You always _sound_ friendly, but it’s not true.” Aya stared up at him, he expression remarkably similar to Ran’s, just before he’d declared the Labyrinth to be a piece of cake.

“It will be all right,” he told her, his dark expression fading into the by-now familiar, teasing smile. “I promise.”

Not at all reassured, Aya allowed him to lift her into the window sill, and held out her hands for the crystal that was already rolling smoothly down his arm and across the back of his hand.

“Let’s see what sort of trouble your brother can stir up this time.”


	12. A Little Logic goes the Wrong Way

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In Which Ran Continues to Search for the Best Way to the Castle and Loses another Sidekick

“ - and then he just left,” Ran told Mamoru tiredly. “Nagi pointed me down this path and that’s when I found you.

Mamoru frowned. “The Goblin King really hurt Yohji?”

Ran nodded. He was not normally the confiding type but something about Mamoru inspired trust. At first glance, the other boy had seemed to be his own age. A closer look had revealed that Mamoru was obviously older than he was. The other boy had explained that he had been in the Labyrinth for a very long time, which had led to a discussion on Yohji for reasons that Ran still wasn’t sure that he followed.

“I don’t understand,” Mamoru protested. “He doesn’t -”

“Doesn’t what?” Ran demanded, stopping in his tracks. They were currently following the edge of a very high wall made of white stone, and the reflected sunlight made him wish that he had a pair of sunglasses.

“Doesn’t hurt Yohji,” the other boy finished somewhat lamely. “If it had been him strung up there instead of me, someone would have been along to cut him down before he’d been there more than a few minutes.”

“They didn’t seem overly friendly to me,” Ran told him, remembering the blank look on Yohji’s face after Schuldig had released him.

Mamoru shrugged uncomfortably. “Yohji’s been here a _long_ time. Longer than Farfarello, even. It was Yohji, Farfarello, me, Schrient, Ken, Crawford and then Nagi. Yohji used to look after most of the Labyrinth by himself. After Schrient got here, he just sort of stopped paying attention to most things. He drinks a lot, though probably only the Goblin King knows where he gets it.”

“If I knew who most of those people were?” Ran shook his head. “I just don’t get it.”

“I don’t either,” Mamoru admitted. “Farfarello and I are the only ones who really remember what it used to be like, back when Yohji was, well, better.”

Glancing at his watch, Ran grimaced. He kept forgetting it was broken, and it _hurt_ every time he saw the broken face. “I need to get moving.”

“Sorry,” Mamoru apologized, blushing slightly. “I didn’t mean to hold things up.”

“It’s okay,” Ran assured him. “It’s not as though I know where I’m going, anyway.”

“I’m really sorry,” Mamoru apologized again. “Only Yohji and Crawford can really pick their way through this place without getting lost. I can get you to the next section, but after that I’ll be just as lost as you are.”

“You’ve been really helpful,” Ran told him, smiling for the first time. “Thank you.”

“The doors should be just a little further along here. Come on.”

**

Yohji stared angrily at the bottle of alcohol, which he had carefully sealed and left beside the path half an hour ago.

“I’m going in circles,” he told the hedge beside him. “And I’m not even drunk yet. Schuldig is going to kill_me.”

“I doubt it.”

Yohji whirled around to discover that Nagi had caught up with him. “Don’t scare me like that!”

Nagi shrugged. “Sorry.”

Relaxing slightly, the blonde lit a cigarette and sighed heavily. “Schuldig is going to kill me,” he repeated dully.

“I don’t think so,” Nagi told him again, furrowing his brow. “The Labyrinth is keeping you in my section on purpose. I’ve tried to find my way to Mamoru’s part of the Labyrinth twice now, and I can’t find the path.”

Yohji’s eyebrows climbed upwards. “You can’t get through your own section? What the hell is he up to?”

The boy shrugged. “I can’t tell if he’s doing it on purpose, or if it’s something the Labyrinth itself decided to do. Whatever the reason, we’re cut off.”

“You don’t understand, Nagi,” Yohji told him somewhat desperately. “I need to get to the gates. I met up with the Goblin King after I left you and he is seriously pissed off at me. If I don’t get there before he decides to check up on me, you may never see me again.”

Nagi bit his lip. “But The Goblin King doesn’t -”

Yohji him a dark look. “Don’t go there. Just get me the hell out of here.”

Giving Yohji a somewhat worried look, Nagi moved to the edge of the path. Closing his eyes, he rested his hands against the thick furze that made up the barrier. Several minutes went by before the hedge grudgingly began to shift. It took Yohji only seconds to eel past his younger comrade and through the gap, which snapped shut behind him.

“Are you all right?” Nagi called.

Yohji looked around and sighed in irritated resignation. On this side of the hedge was an unforgiving stretch of rocky cliffs. The tops were adorned with weathered stone and abandoned statuary. Below him stretched miles of leafy green, the roof of the forest which encircled the Bog of Eternal Stench and stretched all the way to the junkyard. “For someone who just went from the frying pan into the fire, I’m fine.”

“Don’t tell me. I just let you through the northeast barrier, didn’t I?”

Yohji slumped against a nearby stone and stared at the faraway castle, which gleamed enticingly in the reflected rays of the setting sun. “Yeah. And I thought Schuldig was pissed off before.”

“I’m sorry.” They all knew that Yohji was not allowed any contact with Schrient. Nagi tried to get the hedge to open again, but while it rustled, it would not budge. “I could try to find Farfarello?”

“At this point, I don’t think he’d do more than laugh.” Yohji looked down to find another bottle, this one full, resting against the hedge. “I think I’ll just stay here for a bit. Can’t get myself into any _more_ trouble, after all.”

**

Aya stared at the tall figure in the crystal as he discarded his cigarette and continued to stare, unseeing, at the horizon. She had been uncomfortably aware of the sudden tensing of the arms which encircled her when the boy had opened a way in the wall for her brother’s friend. She glanced over her shoulder to encounter another of those hurt, angry looks from the Goblin King. The expression disappeared almost instantly, but she knew what she had seen.

“Why do you hate him?” she found herself asking.

Schuldig’s eyebrows went up and he frowned at the little girl. “Who, Yohji?”

Aya nodded, closing her hands over the tiny scene and cutting off the Goblin King’s view of the other man. “Are you going to hurt him again?”

He stared at her, surprised at the angry flush in her cheeks. “Are you worrying about _Yohji_? What about your brother?”

“Ran will come to get me,” she assured him, refusing to be sidetracked. “Why do you hate him?”

Schuldig’s frown deepened slightly. “I don’t hate Yohji.”

“Then why did you hurt him?”

“You are a decidedly inconvenient little girl,” he informed her, eyes narrowing. “That is between the two of us and none of your business.”

“But - ”

“No.” He lifted her hands from the crystal and twirled it between his fingers. “Let’s have another look at your brother, shall we?”

Scowling, Aya allowed him to bring the crystal once more before her eyes. Ran was walking quickly along the edge of a very tall wall, another teenager beside him. They had their heads together and were obviously talking about something of some interest to them both. Before any sound could come through however, the boys came to an abrupt halt.

**

“What the -”

Mamoru tilted his head to one side and stared at the pair of identical wooden doors set into the wall. “This is different,” he told Ran thoughtfully.

“I really, really don’t like the doors here,” Ran said. He examined both doors carefully, from what he felt might be a safe distance. They were featureless, no lock, handle or hinges in evidence. It did not reassure him. The doors looked remarkably solid and heavy. “What was here before?” he asked.

“Well, these doors,” the other boy confessed. “But they had knockers, fancy brass faces with rings.”

“So there’s no way through?” Ran pushed experimentally on the left hand door. It didn’t budge.

“Oh, there’s always a way through,” Mamoru assured him. “Sometimes it’s just a bit trickier than others.”

“Great.” Ran slumped against the door and sighed. “I’m hungry and tired and I’d just had a really, really long day _before_ any of this started.”

“So am I,” the other boy admitted. “I’ve been tied up through two meals. We should be able to get something at the castle, though.”

“Are you going to get into trouble for helping me?” Ran asked, absently running his fingers against the smooth timbers of the door.

Mamoru shrugged. “No one told me not to.”

Ran blew out a frustrated breath at the reminder of the unpredictable Goblin King and let his head fall backward to connect gently with the door. Moments later, he found himself sprawled on his back as the door almost seemed to fly out from behind him. “Oooof!”

“’Knock, and the door will open,’” Mamoru proclaimed, one hand going up to conceal a wide smile. “Looks like you found the way through after all.”

“Ha, ha,” Ran grumbled, climbing to his feet and dusting himself off. He turned in the doorway and found himself staring down a dusty path that wound between ancient trees and off into the gloom of the deep forest.

“This bit is going to be dangerous,” Mamoru warned him, pulling another dart from somewhere within the sleeve of his jacket. “You need to keep your eyes and ears open.”

“You’re not afraid, are you?” Ran asked, looking back at him in some surprise.

Mamoru grimaced. “You don’t think I tied _myself_ up and hung myself from that tree, do you?”

“In this place, nothing surprises me.”

**

Nagi stared at the section of hedge that he had opened for Yohji, a worried expression making him look even younger than usual. He could not get the barrier to open again, no matter what he tried. The barrier was there as much to keep Schrient out as it was to keep him in. He, Schrient and Ken were all firmly anchored to their own sections of the Labyrinth. At least that’s what he’d heard from Mamoru and Yohji. Naturally enough, he’d never met Ken _or_ Schrient.

Yohji…. Nagi frowned. Something was going on, something much deeper than one of the Goblin King’s usual games. He may have been the last of the Guardians to arrive here, but he wasn’t either blind or stupid. He’d seen Schuldig’s odd relationship with Yohji in action, and he would have been willing to swear that the Goblin King would never actually harm Yohji.

But Yohji had been lost and wandering for as long as Nagi had known him, the sarcastic comments and easy smiles hiding something much darker. And Schuldig watched him. Yohji was probably the only one who didn’t know just how closely.

Reaching a sudden decision, he turned away from the hedge and headed back the way he had came. He needed to talk to the Goblin King. His assigned section had it’s bounds, but there were ways and there were ways.

**

“Schrient is dangerous,” Mamoru repeated as the two boys moved further into the woods. “I don’t know exactly what they’re doing here, or why they all arrived in a group. I do know that they hate my guts. They listen to Farfarello and Crawford, but Yohji won’t go anywhere near them. Ken sees them sometimes, because their sections of the Labyrinth have a common border, but Ken just doesn’t care.”

“And Nagi?” Ran turned to send a suspicious look at the shadowy spaces beneath the trees as they moved stealthily down the path. Ran was moving in the front, Mamoru keeping an eye out behind them.

“Nagi is tied to his section, and the only common border he has with Schrient is the cliffs.” Mamoru turned to wave one arm to their left. “Schuldig doesn’t encourage the women to leave the forest.”

“I want to thank you for your help,” Ran said, still sweeping the vegetation with his eyes.

There was no answer.

“Mamoru?” Ran turned to look over his shoulder. There was no sign of the other boy. “Mamoru?”

**

Crawford frowned as the Labyrinth continued to change. “Something is wrong.”

Beside him, the Farfarello leaned carelessly against a tree. “Something has been wrong for a while now. The symptoms are finally becoming visible, that’s all.”

“No. There’s more to it than that.” Crawford rubbed at his eyes, trying to focus on what he was seeing. “I don’t like this.”

Farfarello shrugged. “I’m off. I want to see if I can find Mamoru.”

Turning, Crawford opened his mouth to ask the other man a question, only to find him already gone. “Damn it.” He turned back to the Labyrinth, finding it again changed almost beyond recognition.

“I need to talk to the Goblin King.”

**

Nagi stepped into Schuldig’s throne room, only to find himself the recipient of a disconcerting stare. Wide plum-colored eyes surveyed him critically and the little girl sitting on the Goblin King’s throne tilted her head to one side. “Who are you?” she asked suspiciously.

“That,” came a voice from behind the teen, causing him to jump slightly, “is Nagi.”

“Y-your Majesty,” Nagi stammered, feeling one of the Goblin King’s hands coming to rest on his shoulder.

“That would be me, yes.” Schuldig propelled him gently toward the throne. “Nagi, this is Aya. Aya, this is Nagi. Now, I want the two of you to go play quietly together in the garden, all right?”

Nagi raised an eyebrow, turning to face the older man. “You want me to babysit?”

Schuldig’s eye-blinding white attire consisted of a form-fitting coat, white lawn shirt, a frothy cravat and very tight breeches. It was a bit of a departure from his normal attire, but the Goblin King’s rather eclectic wardrobe was different practically every time you turned around anyway, Nagi observed cynically. 

Schuldig raised an eyebrow in return and smiled. “As you don’t seem to be doing anything else at the moment?”

The thinly veiled reference to Nagi’s technical dereliction of duty had the boy bowing low before the little girl in a matter of seconds. “Come along, Aya. I think you’ll enjoy the gardens.”

Now was _not_ the time to try to start a serious discussion. Obviously.

**

“Mamoru?” Ran looked to the left and right, fighting down a rising sense of fear. “Mamoru!?” The forest seemed somehow darker now that he was alone, more menacing and filled with horrible possibilities.

“Never take anything for granted. I _get_ it.” He looked again at the path and forced himself to take a step forward, and then another. “Enough with the object lessons.”


	13. Smoking is the Least of his Problems

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In Which the Story Decides to take a Left Turn

In the hours since the Goblin King had terrorized his small subjects into sanitizing the marble columns of his throne room, toys and bits of left-over dinner had once again begun to accumulate in dark corners. Small, black footprints tracked across the floor which mere hours ago had been a gleaming mirror. There were small giggling forms in the myriad alcoves, whispering from the shadows behind the tall pillars and even two small creatures swinging in the chandelier far overhead.

Crawford paused just inside the room and curled his lip. While it was true that he did not overly relish the company of the Goblin King, his avoidance of the smirking lord of the Labyrinth was due in no small part to his dislike of the goblins. He glanced to the left and right, searching for Schuldig. It took a few minutes, but he eventually made out a flash of white to his left.

The goblins hushed as the tall man moved into their midst, darting out of his path as he strode toward the high windows. The small twisted creatures were not as familiar with Crawford as with Schuldig’s favorite companion, but it had taken only one or two encounters to teach them that he was also someone to be feared.

Crawford reached the window and took a moment to look down at Schuldig. The youthful features of the Goblin Kingwere impassive, almost empty, as he stared across his domain. The sun would not actually set for several hours yet, but dark shadows were already creeping across the Labyrinth and that blackness was apparently echoed in the Goblin King’s mood.

“Crawford.”

It was an acknowledgement and demand for explanation all rolled together in one terse word. Despite himself, Crawford felt his eyebrows rise in surprise. Schuldig delighted in teasing and laughter. This was a drastic change in mood.

“What are you planning?”

Schuldig spun a crystal out of the air, danced it across his knuckles and stared at it reflectively for a moment before tossing it at the taller man. “I am planning…this.”

Catching the crystal, Crawford spun it once himself before bringing it to eye level. “Show me,” he commanded.

**

Ran moved carefully through the forest, fighting off the unhappy feeling that he was being watched. What could possibly be so scary about a bunch of girls, er, women? Of course, they _had_ gotten the jump on Mamoru.

Ran noted the deepening shadows with no little distrust. Mamoru had said something about the forest stretching all the way to the edge of the junkyard. None of this sounded anything like the book but very little of what he had experienced thus far had been anything like his favorite book. In fact, the very thought of Schuldig as the darkly romantic anti-hero of the Labyrinth made his hair stand on end. He remembered the distinctly hungry 'cat and mouse' look that the Goblin King had given him in the tunnels beneath the Labyrinth and shivered.

'Not in _this_ lifetime.'

Distracted by his thoughts, Ran rounded a corner and nearly ran into someone. Backpedaling rapidly, he blinked in surprise. Seated in the middle of the path and gazing quizzically up at him was a girl with blue hair. She blinked wide eyes at him over the stuffed animal that she was clutching in her arms.

‘Uh-oh….’ Ran continued to back away, only to be brought to an abrupt halt by a tall tree.

“What do you think?” the girl asked conversationally.

As Ran debated whether or not to answer this non-sequitur, it became obvious that the girl was addressing the rather tattered looking stuffed rabbit. She tilted her head to one side and gave him a considering look. “I think you’re right,” she answered seriously. “He must be the one.”

“The one what?” Ran, deciding that he should be a part of this conversation.

“The one that we’re supposed to chase,” she told him, a wide smile appearing on her solemn little face. She got to her feet, revealing an outfit that made Ran wonder just where the denizens of the Labyrinth found their somewhat eclectic clothing.

“I’d really rather not be chased,” Ran told her, edging away around the bole of the tree. “In fact, I’ll just be running along now….” His voice died away as he found himself eye to eye with a rather under-dressed blonde.

“Why, hello there,” she purred, leaning toward him. The gleam in her eye reminded him strongly of the one worn by Schuldig, and he couldn’t decide which unsettled him more.

“Um, I seem to have taken a wrong turn somewhere,” he told her, changing direction and beginning to back away. “I’ll just be running along -”

“You’re not going anywhere,” a flat voice informed him.

Ran found himself flanked by two more women, both clad in outfits that left very little to the imagination. Ran was used to being the center of attention wherever he went, mostly due to the rather startling color of his hair. This, however, was attention of a very different sort.

‘I’ll be lucky if I live long enough to end up hanging from a tree,’ he reflected miserably. With a sigh, he allowed his shoulders to slump. Out of the corner of his eye he watched the blonde’s pose relax as he appeared to accept his defeat.

That opening was all that he needed. Ran dove forward, slipping between the tall woman and the path to dive headlong into the undergrowth.

“Quick, after him!”

**

Schuldig watched as Crawford’s eyes widened and an expression of genuine shock and horror spread across the American’s face. Normally, he would have found this reaction unbelievably funny. One thin lip twitched as the Goblin King had to admit to himself that, even under these circumstances, he still found it amusing.

Crawford continued to stare into the crystal, his shocked expression fading into something approaching grim resignation. It was some time before he tore his eyes away from the events taking place in the gleaming orb, and those eyes were dark with a number of conflicting emotions.

“Are you _mad_?” he hissed. “This, this is –“

“Beyond your capabilities.” The Goblin King had gone back to staring out over his kingdom. “You wanted to know what I was planning and I showed you. I never said that you would understand it.”

“This could destroy us all,” Crawford snapped, clenching one fist over the crystal.

“Hmmm. It could. People will die, that much is certain,” Schuldig agreed.

“You are not just risking your kingdom and everyone in it, you are risking yourself! What could possibly be worth that? Don’t try telling me that it’s all because you’re bored. This is far and beyond your normal amusements, bizarre as they are.”

The Goblin King pulled one leg up onto the sill and rested his chin on his knee. “I’m not doing this for amusement, Crawford. I admit that it began that way, but -”

“But?”

Schuldig sighed. “I’m sure that you’ve noticed the way the Labyrinth has been behaving today?”

Crawford nodded. “Farfarello thought that it was you.”

“In a way, it probably was,” the Goblin King agreed absently. “We’re two parts of the same whole, if you look at it in a certain light. But I’m not controlling it, at the moment. It was trying to draw my attention to something.”

Crawford’s thoughts flashed back to the way the Labyrinth had been turning and twisting. A thought struck him. The Labyrinth had been unusually cooperative this morning, accepting orders almost as if….

“What is happening to the Labyrinth?” The question seemed to hang in the air between the two men, blunt and heavy. Crawford scowled, unsure of what had caused him to blurt that out instead of beginning with the more subtle questions that were his hallmark.

“It is… surviving,” Schuldig finally answered him. The Goblin King was absently spinning another of his crystals between his fingers and it glinted enticingly in the fading sunlight, showing mere flashes of this or that as it twirled across and around his hand.

“Surviving?” Crawford felt a strange, sinking sensation in the pit of his stomach. What’s wrong?”

Schuldig looked up at him, expression still flat. “Can’t you feel it?”

Seriously disturbed by the sudden change in what he had always felt to be the only true constant in the changing world of the Labyrinth, Crawford found a seat in the window opposite the Goblin King and stared out into the sunset. He reached out toward the vastness which was their world and concentrated.

\- Fear - Anger - Sorrow -

-Loss-

Beneath the surging emotions was a hard knot of worry and anguish, but Crawford could not pin down what was causing all the turmoil. He relaxed, carefully letting go of the awareness and opening his eyes. Straightening his glasses, he turned to look at Schuldig. The Goblin King was once again staring sightlessly out over the Labyrinth. Crawford could feel a faint echo of that worry dance across his nerves as he took in the emotionless mask worn by the the Goblin King. "What's wrong?" he repeated.

Schuldig did not look away from the landscape, his gaze searching for something on the far horizon. His voice was very soft when he finally answered and Crawford had to lean forward to catch the words.

"Kudou is dying."

**

Ran fought his way through the shrubs beside the path and broke into the forest proper. The huge branches overhead did not allow enough light to filter through to let other things grow easily here and the he had plenty of room to run.

It was rapidly growing darker as night fell, and Schrient had the advantage of knowing the area inside out. Ran contented himself with running as fast as he could. It wasn’t doing him a lot of good. Every so often he would catch a glimpse of one of the women out of the corner of his eye, usually the blonde or the brunette with the visor and the hard voice.

The blonde had a whip, and he bore the marks of several near misses where she had tried to wrap the thing around him and trip him up. He didn’t know what sort of weapons the other three carried, and had no desire to find out. Images from the encounter by the main gate flashed unpleasantly through his imagination, gouts of dark blood coloring the deepening shadows as he ran.

He was tired, unbelievably tired. He had been in the Labyrinth for hours, and it had been the end of a long stressful day when he had first arrived. He was hungry, worn down and terrified. He _had_ to make it through the Labyrinth. It was his fault that Aya was trapped here, and he would not be able to live with himself if he could not get her away from this horrible place and back home to where she belonged.

Of course, if he failed, living with himself might not be an option. He tried not to think about it too hard.

Ran wasn’t stupid. He knew that Schrient was playing with him, herding him to and fro. He also knew that they were over-confident and he still hoped to somehow play that against them.

**

Crawford stared at Schuldig as the sun began its final descent below the horizon. “You’re not serious.”

“He was dying when he came here, Crawford. He didn’t _want_ to die, at the time. He was struggling against it with a strength that surprised me.” Schuldig leaned forward and wrapped his arms around his knee, sighing. “That’s why I answered his call, really. Not that he knew who he was calling or what he was getting into.”

“I don’t understand,” Crawford admitted, his frustration getting the better of him.

“Oh, he recovered,” the Goblin King assured him. “Good as new, for a while. One thing led to another, unfortunately. The Labyrinth is a place of magic, of will. I do what I can, but I can’t be everywhere and I can’t foresee everything.”

Crawford found his gaze caught and held by those of his king and held his tongue, surprised at the deep anger in the back of those eyes.

“Kudou no longer cares if he lives or dies,” Schuldig told him bitterly. “And that’s an illness I can’t cure. The Labyrinth is reacting because it is trying to keep him alive, an exercise in futility if ever there was one. Kudou has to _want_ to live.”

The American took a hasty step backward as the Goblin King unfolded himself from his seat in one violent, graceful motion and strode toward his throne. “If Kudou dies, the Labyrinth -?”

“If Kudou dies,” Schuldig bit out, coming to a halt, “the Labyrinth, or at least a large part of it, may very well die with him. He’s been here too long, and he’s made himself a part of it – or it of him.”

“What will you do?”

“What will I do?” The Goblin King pivoted and the cruel smile that spread across his features was the most natural expression that Crawford had seen him exhibit since walking through the doors of the throne room. “I have already begun.”

**

For some reason, even with the sun’s descent behind the cliffs, there was still enough light beneath the trees for Ran to keep moving. He was nearly ready to drop from exhaustion, but he was afraid to. He had apparently lost Schrient for the moment, but he knew that they were still looking for him, knew also that they were herding him toward the cliffs.

“I’m in deep, deep trouble.” Understatement, that he recognized as he spoke the words. “Don’t take anything for granted.”

Gritting his teeth, he kept going.

**

Farfarello was halted in his search for the missing Takatori boy by the arrival of an extremely unhappy Crawford.

"Forget it," he was told bluntly. "We have much more important things to be doing."

"Such as?" One white eyebrow lifted and Farfarello tilted his head inquiringly.

"Surviving."


	14. Magic isn't What it Used to Be

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which we learn a little bit about the Labyrinth, the Goblin King and the Underground.
> 
> Originally, this chapter was number 13, and I put it up as a bit of a side-ways joke because 13 is bad luck and none of the characters wanted to cooperate with me. With this revision, I wish I'd woven this part in earlier, but it's a chunk of rather odd exposition that doesn't really fit anywhere else. It'll eventually all make sense, but you can skip it if you'd like.

A thousand, thousand years ago the various worlds were governed by belief. The strength of a person’s will determined not only their own destiny, but occasionally the fate of those around them as well.

Elves, Dragons, High Faerie nobles and Things That Go Bump in the Night were all common. There was high adventure, true love and, of course, happily ever after. Heroes, anti-heroes and villains all moved in a fantastic dance in which the pure of heart tried to prove their worth.

A thousand, thousand years ago there were realms within realms, worlds of danger and hatred, worlds of excitement and romance. Beneath them all ran a place called the Underground.

The Underground is a place that calls to the outcasts and the misfits. Even the monsters that inhabit it are creatures that could fit in nowhere else. It is not a place of peace or tranquility, but it is a place where you can be alive and live to the utmost of your potential. It is a world different from all the others, containing elements of each in an eclectic sprawl that never really ends. If there is nowhere else that will take you in, there will be a place for you here.

The center of the Underground, its heart and mind, is the dream of its most powerful misfit. From it emanates the magic which drives the twists and turns of the Underground, and it is called the Labyrinth.

No one can agree how long the Labyrinth has stood, or when the massive outer walls grew up to protect its denizens from the rest of the Underground. It is remembered that once the huge passageways and tall hedges were open to anyone. It is also remembered that the Labyrinth was once empty, from the tall stone walls near the outer edge to the dark stone tunnels beneath, to the edges of the shining white castle at the center.

It seemed to grow a life of its own as various creatures found their way inside, becoming a place of both refuge and hidden freedom. The inhabitants here, unlike the rest of the Underground, were the truly desperate and unwanted. The grew up to hide what lies within, an interesting reflection on the creature who created them.

The Goblin King has been in the Underground forever.

He is the center of the magic, the center of its life. He is capricious, selfish and a mystery even to those closest to him.

No one knows from where he came or why, although the various stories range from the improbable to the fantastic. He is known to come and go without warning or trace. He grants wishes, oftentimes to the detriment of the wisher. He moves through the dance which is his life to a tune that only he can hear, and no one knows from whence the music comes.

He has a name, although it has never been spoken. He answers to no one, although he allows some to call him Schuldig. The Labyrinth is said to be his soul, given form to shelter those who have nowhere else to go. It is said to be a test of will, a puzzle to challenge those who might yet become something more and a last chance for those on the edge of being lost.

It is also said that the Goblin King is a sadistic weaver of dreams, a creature who exists to feed off the misery of others. Why else would he steal children? Why else would he turn the creatures who fall into his hands into monsters? Why else would he force the unfortunates who cross him to play his dangerous games?

Why indeed?

If he has given a straight answer to any of these questions, no one can recall it. For all his teasing and taunting, the Goblin King really says very little of substance, even to those closest to him.

Over the centuries, the Goblin King has avoided close contact with any but the creatures that find their way within the Labyrinth itself. In the outer worlds those who believe can still wish for his aid, although where and how he responds appears to be governed only by his own whims. The limits on his power have yet to be determined, and he answers to no other power.

No power that we know of.

And the Labyrinth?

It can be a haven or a hellish prison, a place of beauty or darkest terror. It moves and changes seemingly at random, never the same from one moment to the next. It echoes that which gives it form, and defines that power in its turn.

Some mysteries are eternal -

\- and some are puzzles that only require the proper key.

Of all the worlds which used to intersect, only the Underground remains to connect them all. Only here can the wretched still find sanctuary from the places which cannot accept them. Only here is there always a sanctuary to be found.

So welcome to the Labyrinth.

We hope that you enjoy your stay.


	15. Yohji to the Rescue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In Which Things Begin to Fall Apart

Aya followed the new arrival down a flight of wide, marble stairs and through several ornately decorated corridors before stopping. “Wait.”

Nagi stopped and glanced over his shoulder at the little girl. “What is it?”

“I - we’re not leaving the castle, are we?”

He shook his head, turning to face her, wondering again at her age and quickness of wit. “No. The gardens are within the castle walls. Why?”

“He told me that if I left the castle, he’d turn my brother into one of the stone faces.” Aya bit her lip and fidgeted with the hem of her pajama shirt, fingers dipping into one of the decorated pockets.

“It’s all right,” Nagi assured her, a very small smile briefly illuminating his solemn features. “He told us to go there. He won’t punish us for following orders.”

After a brief hesitation, Aya moved forward and stared up at him. Silently, she extended one small hand. Nagi took it gently in his and they continued down the corridor. The rest of the trip through the castle was accomplished in silence, but for the faraway chatter of the goblins. Aya soon lost track of the twists and turns that Nagi led her through, contenting herself with counting the many long stairways that took them down toward the ground from the Goblin King’s lofty tower.

Eventually they emerged into a large, walled garden. Birdsong came from the arching branches of the trees along the walls and the small, flowering shrubs which lined the paved path. The sound of falling water indicated the presence of a fountain somewhere further inside. Releasing her guide’s hand, she followed the path toward the sound, pausing now and then to stare at the exotic plants that grew on every side. Some of them stared back.

Nagi followed her as she wended her way further into the garden, watching her begin to relax and exclaim with delight over the various strange flowers.

Twenty minutes later, the little girl came across a fantastical fountain and spent a few minutes twirling her fingers in the water before recalling where she was. She turned and sank down into the neatly trimmed grass, clasping her knees and staring up at Nagi. “What’s going on?”

He found himself a comfortable seat on the edge of the fountain and looked down at her. “Specifically, or in general?”

She scowled at him, small face holding none of the icy menace that her teenaged brother had already mastered. “You sound just like _him_.”

“The Goblin King?” Nagi couldn’t decide whether to be hurt or flattered. “He sort of wears off on you after a while.”

“He’s _mean_ ,” Aya informed him, with the absolute assurance of the very young. “He keeps hurting Ran’s friend, and he’s mean to Ran.”

“Did you actually see what he did to Yohji?” Nagi asked, eyes suddenly serious. “Did the Goblin Kingreally hurt him?”

Aya nodded solemnly. “But he said….”

Nagi waited.

“He said that he didn’t hate him. I asked why he hurt him then, and he said that it was none of my business.” Aya pouted at that, thrusting out her lower lip and frowning even more.

Nagi leaned back against the fountain and looked up into the darkening sky above them. “I wish….” He stopped himself before completing the fatal phrase. “I wonder what is going on between those two. I mean, things have been wrong between them for as long as I’ve known them, but -”

The little girl looked up at him for a long moment and then slowly, almost reluctantly, reached into the pocket of her pajamas. The fading light seemed to be drawn to the sparkling crystal that she withdrew and held cradled before her. As the boy watched, shocked, she drew in a deep breath and spoke.

“Show me the Goblin King.”

It would be impossible to describe the mad whirl of color and blur of images that almost burst forth from the glittering crystal. Both children stared at the display with awe, trying to make sense of the dizzying swirl of light and sound.

Among the pictures which appeared with the most clarity and remained the longest was one of Schuldig with a long, green jacket wrapped closely around him. He had a yellow scarf tying back his normally wild hair and a pair of tinted sunglasses resting on top of his head. He held a gun in one hand and there was a trickle of blood from one corner of his mouth. His face was grim as he turned, firing at someone just out of their range of view.

“What the -?” Nagi began, dropping to his knees to better see exactly what was going on. The image faded as he did so, replaced by one of the redheaded Goblin King in a similar outfit, this one white. He was standing in a dark corridor, almost nose to nose with -

“Ran?”

“I’ve seen him like this before,” Aya whispered, “older and angrier. I don’t know why.”

This older, black-clad Ran had a naked blade in one hand and was obviously fighting the urge to sheathe it in the body of the man before him. Schuldig, in his turn, was smirking in a manner all too familiar to the observers. As they watched, Ran swung at the other man, his face twisted with fury. Schuldig dodged easily, laughing as the image faded away.

Nagi placed his hands over Aya’s, hiding the ever-changing images from view. “My head is starting to hurt. I’m not going to ask how you got that, or how you managed to use it, but I don’t think that we’re going to find our answers this way.”

The little girl nodded reluctantly. “I suppose. But it showed me Ran before, so I thought -”

“That must be the future, or _a_ future. Crawford might be able to tell us but I don’t know where he is and, frankly, I’m not sure I want him to know what we’re up to.” Nagi released his gentle hold on her fingers and sat back on his heels. “There must be a way to find out what is going on here.”

Aya opened her fingers and stared down at the crystal, watching as it sparkled invitingly in her hands. “Show me why,” she told it, her soft voice holding a determined note.

**

Ages past, a young boy fled his family home. With the death of his mother, the whispers and muttered threats had grown louder. His strangely colored eyes and hair had always caused comment in the homogenous culture of his mother, drawing whispered accusations of demonic influences. Such rumors were only strengthened by the boy’s obvious lack of a father.

Running desperately, searching for a place where he would not face either primitive exorcism or rather more permanent methods of ‘banishment’, the boy fell into a place called the Underground. He wandered there from place to place, finding people and creatures of every description and making himself a place among them. He became known as a resourceful young man, someone who could be depended upon to undertake difficult jobs of varying degrees of morality. You could not call him a criminal, as the Underground had no real laws of its own.

As he traveled, he crossed paths with a girl. She was just his own age, equally resourceful and showing the world a bright smile that masked an inner determination which had to be seen to be believed. As if fated, their paths crossed more and more often and they eventually became partners.

The Underground, however, is not one of those realms where good intentions and true love will protect you from harm. By its very nature, the Goblin King’s realm attracts those with unusual ideas of property ownership and relationships. One dark evening, the boy and his partner took on a project which older and wiser heads would probably have left alone.

In the end, the young man was left crumpled against a wall in the darkness of a back alley, bleeding slowly to death as he cradled the body of his partner in his arms. In that darkness, as the rain fell around him, he cried. Holding the body of the woman he loved, he waited to die. The soft sound of the rain was broken by a ragged whisper, “I wish -”

His voice died away as he realized he was no longer alone in the alley. A tall figure sank to his knees on the filthy floor of the alley, and long fingered hands tugged the still form from his arms. Gentle pressure was placed on a wound that he could no longer even feel as a strange voice asked him, “Are you sure that this is what you really want?”

Darkness overtook all as the rain began to fall more heavily and he slumped forward into the stranger’s arms.

**

As the light continued to fade, Ran was forced to give up his panicked flight in favor of creeping stealthily through the underbrush. He could hear the occasional crackle of broken stems or bracken that let him know that Schrient had not lost him yet.  
Ran was still being herded toward the cliff and his hopes of reaching the castle before time ran out were fast fading away.

He was a very long way from the path that Mamoru had chosen for him and had no idea of how to get back to it. The cliffs were at least a constant, and if he stayed far enough ahead of the psychotic foursome, he might even manage to slip past them and follow the cliff out of the forest.

It was a theory, anyway.

Judging by the increased noise in the forest around him, Schrient had reached the same conclusion and were racing to cut him off. The welts inflicted by the blonde’s whip ached viciously, and he had absolutely no desire to gain more. He continued to move toward the cliffs, putting on a little extra speed.

Speed turned out to be his downfall. He broke through a small stand of trees to find himself out in the open. There was a fifty yard stretch along the foot of the cliffs that had been carefully cleared of all vegetation. He turned to seek cover again in the foliage, only to find the way blocked by the woman wearing the darkened shield before her eyes.

With a tired curse, Ran started away down the cleared strip. He didn’t get more than about fifty yards or so before the blonde appeared in his path and cut him off. He veered away as the blue- haired girl made her appearance, followed by the fourth woman.

Left without options, he backed toward the sheer rock wall that marked the edge of Schrient’s territory. The women were laughing softly as they advanced on him and he fought with the impulse to simply turn tail and run, trying to slip through their fingers again. He was too tired for this maneuver, however, and he knew it.

“Damn it! Mamoru? Kudou? Where are you?”

**

Farfarello followed Crawford swiftly through the Labyrinth. He was having no problem keeping up with the other man physically, but mentally he had been left in the dust almost fifteen minutes ago.

“I don’t understand,” he growled. “How can he risk it? The Labyrinth, the Undergound, _everything_ could go up in smoke. And even if he is willing to let them go, what about his _own_ life?”

Crawford shrugged irritably. “It doesn’t appear to be particularly high on his list of priorities on the moment. As it is, he’s already woven his webs rather tightly around us. He’s waiting for something, some trigger. Once things are set in motion, there will be no way out for any of us.”

“So what are we doing?” Farfarello demanded. “We can’t interfere with his magic and any tampering with the forces already in motion could get us all killed!”

“We’re taking precautions,” Crawford told him. “The Labyrinth itself is a reservoir of power. There are certain contingencies which can be allowed for. It will survive longer than anything else if things go wrong, and we can use that to our advantage.”

“I don’t understand,” Farfarello repeated, his voice softer now. “What could he be thinking?”

“He’s not thinking.” Crawford sped up and the two men now almost flew through the paths of the gigantic maze. “He’s feeling, and that makes everything just that much more dangerous.”

Farfarello threw up his head, breathing in deeply as they ran. “Something is about to change. I can _feel_ it.”

**

Ken lay on his back on one of the wide branches of the gigantic tree that stood beside the bridge. He let his arms and legs dangle off the limb, staring up at the leaves above him.

“I am soooooooo bored. If there really is a hell, then I’m in it. What the fuck was Crawford thinking? Guard the bridge from who, passing mosquitoes? Did he think some of the nearby rocks would suddenly decide to take an evening stroll?”

There was no answer to his obviously rhetorical questions, and he dragged one of his arms up to rest it theatrically across his eyes.

“I’m doomed to an eternity of performing pointless tasks to the specifications of the most anal-retentive obsessive-compulsive in the known universe. Somehow, somewhere I must have royally pissed someone off.”

**

The Goblin King slouched in his throne, again idly dancing one of his crystals across his knuckles. Things were moving more quickly now although, as usual, not exactly along the lines he had planned.

“The lengths that I go to for you,” he whispered, rolling the ball up one arm, across his shoulders and down the other. When it reached his other hand, he spun the crystal again and then tossed it into the air. It hovered obediently at eye level, casting red and orange sparks as it reflected the myriad torches springing to life around the room with the fall of true night.

“Show me the boy.”

**

Aya and Nagi watched, transfixed, as the Goblin King gathered up the limp and bleeding form of a much younger Kudou Yohji and disappeared, leaving the alley empty save for the broken body of a young girl and a large quantity of blood.

“I don’t understand,” Aya whispered, eyes wide and shining with appalled tears.

“I do,” Nagi assured her, his own face a bit white. He again laid his hand against hers. “Show us how.”

**

When Kudou Yohji awoke, it was with the blank certainty that there was some vital part of himself that had been ripped away. He found himself tucked neatly into a comfortable bed in a small room with a heavy wooden door and tall windows.

When he looked out of the high windows and gazed at the expanse of the Labyrinth for the first time, it was with an overwhelming sense of awe. It hadn’t been until much later that he had realized that the Labyrinth had possessed a clear boundary on his first viewing, a high wall which enclosed everything and clearly delineated its borders. The stories of the great maze had spoken of the castle and of the forest, of the empty tunnels and the deserted gardens… but they had never spoken of giant walls and invisible gates.

When he finally ventured forth, it was to discover that his new home was a room in one of the towers of the fantastical castle that stood at the center of the Labyrinth. He had seen the Labyrinth many times, but it was harder to reach than it looked, and he had never actually been there, although he knew people who had. He had no memory as to how he had arrived here, or what the empty ache inside him really was.

The Goblin King, when he finally appeared, told him only that things had gone wrong and that he had asked for the Lord of the Labyrinth to intervene. The Goblin King had been nothing like the stories that Yohji had heard, nothing like the rumors. Schuldig, as he asked Yohji to call him, had a truly wicked sense of humor and seemingly inexhaustible patience.

Yohji was allowed to wander as he liked, explore every corner of the castle and the Labyrinth. Wherever he went, whatever questions he had, Schuldig would be there if he needed him. It had been mildly disconcerting at first, getting lost within the giant gardens or deep in the tunnels. He soon ceased to feel ill at ease, however. Whenever he would begin to feel that he would never see the castle again, Schuldig would be waiting for him around the next bend.

As he spent more time within the silent spaces of the deserted Labyrinth, he eventually began to hear birds and animals. As the years passed other, stranger creatures made themselves known to him. Some were creations of the Goblin King and the Labyrinth. Some, like himself, had merely awoken one morning to find themselves within the maze. Schuldig began bringing the goblins home with him, back to the Labyrinth, and he allowed them to begin constructing a city outside of his castle.

Eventually, the Goblin King asked Yohji to watch over the Labyrinth and the creatures inside it. Yohji had been delighted and flattered by the responsibility, throwing himself into the job whole-heartedly. Something about the Labyrinth called to him, made him feel as if he belonged.

It wasn’t until much later that he recognized certain parallels, signs that should have made the true state of affairs obvious, symptoms of a betrayal that would destroy him completely.

**

Mamoru clung to the edge of the rock wall, eyes tightly squeezed closed and trying very hard not to breathe. He had ended up a long, unwilling distance from the forest. The last thing he remembered was the unsettling feel of the earth dropping away beneath his feet, and then a long, twisting slide down a tunnel before emerging here.

Here being a small cliff face just above the Bog of Eternal Stench.

“I don’t know if it was Schrient, The Goblin King or some sadistic twist of the Labyrinth itself, but I hope that whoever is responsible for this _suffers_.”

Carefully, patiently, he attempted to edge his way along the very thin ledge of rock that was the only thing between him and the sucking murk below.

**

Yohji remained slumped against the rock beside which he had found himself after his attempted escape through the barrier. There wasn’t much point in his leaving the spot. The Goblin King knew what had happened, and leaving the scene of the crime wouldn’t help him any. Not that there was anywhere for him to go.

He didn’t have too terribly long to wait before the familiar voice spoke, naturally enough, from behind him.

“You are not supposed to be here, Kudou.”

“I know.” Yohji remained staring off into space.

“An interesting shortcut to the gates, this. You’re heading in quite the wrong direction.”

“I noticed.” Yohji was not surprised when a hand settled on his shoulder. He did not resist as he was turned to face Schuldig.

“Were you really heading for the gate?” the Goblin King mused, eyes staring intently into his own. “Or were you perhaps chasing after your new friend?”

“He’s no friend of mine,” Yohji told him, curling his lip.

“Isn’t he?” Schuldig smiled unpleasantly. “Why do I doubt you?”

“Habit.” Yohji let his eyes drop to the elaborately folded cravat at the Goblin King’s throat and said no more.

“What am I to do with you?” There was suddenly fatigue in that teasing voice, mingled disconcertingly with concern.

Yohji refused to look up, concentrating intently on the creases in the white fabric instead. “Leave me alone,” he responded softly.

The hand on his shoulder tightened its grasp almost convulsively before dropping away. “Hmmmm. And this is what you really want?”

“This is what I really want,” Yohji assured him mechanically. If he could never have freedom, he could at least have the pretense.

“I see.”

Schuldig took a step backward, regarding the slightly taller man with a frown. When Yohji finally looked up the expression had disappeared, replaced by the more familiar mocking smile.

“I have a little errand for you, Yoh…ji,” the Goblin King purred. “In fact, it’s quite fortunate that you ended up here.”

Yohji wanted to back away from that anticipatory look, but the rock was directly behind him and he had nowhere to go. “What do you want me to do?”

“I want you to find your little… friend and give him a present.” Schuldig pulled one of his crystals from the air and let it roll down the back of his hand before tossing it into the air. When it landed again in his palm, it was a ripe, luscious peach.

Yohji could almost feel his mouth watering and at that he did scrabble backward, his progress of necessity sideways, but still away from the Goblin King. He knew what that was, no matter what it looked like, and he wanted no part of it.

“He’s no friend of mine,” Yohji repeated, eyes wide. “But there’s no _way_ I’m going to give him that. I can’t. I won’t!”

Schuldig’s free hand wrapped around his wrist; the redhead suddenly far too close for comfort. He jerked the taller man sharply forward and tripped him, releasing his wrist at the last moment. Yohji sprawled gracelessly on the ground at the feet of his King, wondering at his own temerity. It was never wise to disregard one of Schuldig’s direct orders, and this was Yohji’s second transgression in one day.

‘Bog of Eternal Stench, here I come.’

Pristine white leather boots moved into his field of vision and then stopped. Yohji waited, but several minutes passed and nothing happened. Cautiously, he pulled his arms and legs to him and got to his knees. Schuldig watched him, eyes narrowed but face otherwise expressionless.

“You seem to have developed something of an independent streak of late, Kudou. I am willing to forgive you much, but this is the very last time that I am going to grant you the luxury of a second chance. Do we understand each other?”

Yohji bowed his head. “Yes Majesty.”

“You are going to take _this_ ,” Schuldig produced the peach and held it out, “and you are going to find the boy and give it to him. Do you understand?”

Yohji reached out and took it, trying not to shiver as it pressed against the skin of his palm. “Yes Majesty.”

“Kudou?”

Yohji looked up to find Schuldig regarding him with another of those puzzling, expressionless looks. “Yes?”

“If I suspect, even for an instant, that you harbor any sort of feelings for that boy, it will put me in a very bad mood. Once you’ve given him that,” gesturing again at the peach, “leave him. Stay away from him, Kudou. And that is a direct order.”

Yohji returned his gaze to the ground. Somewhere deep inside he could feel the cold emptiness that was his constant companion slowly stirring to make way for something new. Something warm and painful. Something like hatred. “Yes, Majesty.”

**

Ran wanted to die. He had decided some few minutes ago that death would be far preferable to allowing Schrient to get their hands on him. He had managed to move fast enough to get past the little blue-haired girl with the stuffed rabbit once, but the older women had caught up with him easily and he was now within a few feet of the towering rock wall, trapped by their slowly closing semi-circle.

‘Please, at least let this be quick,’ he prayed. ‘I’m sorry Aya. This was all my fault.’

The blonde slowly uncoiled her whip, smiling with nasty anticipation. “You shouldn’t have run, little boy.” The other tall woman chuckled softly, ceasing her advance to make sure that the blonde had room to swing her whip. Ran swore silently and tried to figure out which would be the best direction to dodge. She chose that moment to begin her attack and Ran, lacking the room to evade, threw up both hands in front of his face waiting for the blow.

There was a whistle and a crack followed by the sound of an impact. Feeling no pain, Ran dared to peer between his fingers. He couldn’t see anything. Dropping his hands entirely, the teenager found himself staring at a familiar expanse of extremely  
tight, black t-shirt. 

“Kudou?”

“Not _now_ , kid,” his rescuer snapped, not bothering to look over his shoulder at the youth. “Back up against the cliff and then move to your right. There’s rope there. Find it and start climbing.”

“But -”

“GO!”

Ran went. There was no opposition from the women. All four members of Schrient were too busy staring at Yohji to pay any attention to their original prey.

“Tot, Schoen, Hel, Neu,” Yohji greeted them evenly, curling his fingers around Schoen’s whip where it was wound about his gloved hand. “I’m sorry, but the young man has business elsewhere. Take your toys and go play somewhere else.”

“You’re not supposed to be here,” Hel snapped, moving forward again to fill the spot she had vacated in Schrient’s loose semi-circle.

“Call it special dispensation.” Yohji gave her a smile that was all teeth. “I’m still Guardian of the gates and passages and, last time I checked, that includes the forest paths.”

“He took you away, last time,” Tot chimed in, playing absently with her stuffed rabbit’s ears. “He said that we weren’t to play with you anymore.”

“He said more than that,” Schoen muttered, re-coiling her whip as Yohji finished unwrapping the lash from his hand.

“I’m sure that he did,” Yohji agreed, expression hardening. “Be that as it may, you’ve had your fun.”

None of the four women moved to retreat, their positions echoing a waiting pose rather than any sort of departure. Yohji’s bared teeth reappeared at their show of silent defiance.

“I realize that you four pride yourself on only respecting strength, but if you piss me off any further, you’re going to find yourselves unable to use the forest paths at all. If you want to spend the rest of your miserable lives huddled against the cliffs that’s your business, but Schuldig would not be pleased and it would not be _my_ job to explain the circumstances to him.”

Hel exchanged glances with Schoen and the two women turned, moving away toward the trees. Tot, after a last look at Neu, followed. Neu continued to stand in front of Yohji, making no move to leave.

Yohji shrugged and deliberately turned his back on her, heading for the rope he had directed Ran to use. He did not hurry as he walked away, nor did he glance backward. The tension in his shoulders, however, did not abate until he was a good distance from the ground and climbing quickly.

**

Ran reached the top of the cliff and heaved himself over onto the flat, flagstone paved surface above. He lay on his back, thoroughly exhausted from the long chase and still shaking slightly as the last of his adrenaline wore off. It was several minutes before Yohji pulled himself onto the clifftop. His first action, once his footing was secure, was to sever the rope which they had used to make their ascent.

“You, you came back for me!” Ran couldn’t keep the amazed relief from leaking into his voice. He pulled himself to his feet and crossed to the older man. “I can’t believe it. You actually came back for me!”

Yohji shifted uncomfortably, staring down at his feet. “Don’t make too much of it. I would have done the same for anyone else.”

“I don’t believe that,” Ran told him, smiling naturally for the first time that Yohji could remember. “I, I just want to thank you. I was so sure that they were going to -”

“Dismember you? They might have, you know. How did you end up in that mess?” The blonde was stalling. The peach, although tucked away wherever Schuldig’s creations went when not needed, was weighing heavily on his mind.

“Mamoru was showing me the way when -”

“Mamoru?” Yohji asked, startled. “When did you run into him?”

“It was right after you took off,” Ran told him, launching into the entire story. Yohji listened to him with only half an ear. In the back of his mind, a little voice was demanding his attention.

‘Once you’ve given him that, leave him. Stay away from him, Kudou. And that is a direct order.’

He could feel his jaw tightening as Ran described the situation he had found Mamoru in. This boy was in trouble, more trouble than he knew. Another one of Schuldig’s little ‘diversions’, although given the strange events of the last day it might be more than just a ‘little’ diversion. Yohji suddenly wished for some of Crawford’s strange gift of seeing bits of the future. He could feel a decision creeping up on him, and he didn’t like the looks of either choice.

“And then she lashed out at me, and suddenly you were there,” Ran finished. He looked up at the blonde. “I haven’t got a lot of time left. Will you help me, or should I try to find my own way?”

Yohji marveled at the change in attitude, although he had seen similar alterations in other young people who trod the Labyrinth. In this particular case, however, the change seemed particularly drastic. ‘He’s _asking_ for my advice. He would actually take no for an answer.’ The choice loomed directly in front of him and he hesitated, unsure if the consequences would be something that he could bear. He looked down into Ran’s pleading eyes and made his decision.

“Yeah, I’ll help you. It’s not like I have anything left to lose.”

He knew that the words were a mistake even as he said them, but the hot bitterness that was slowly growing inside him had demanded they be spoken. He watched, unsurprised, as Ran froze in mid-gesture, eyes locked onto a moment that had frozen. In the eerily suspended landscape, he waited for the Goblin King’s reaction. It was practically instantaneous.

A familiar hand latched itself to his forearm with a strength that could probably bend steel. In a move that was becoming depressingly familiar, Yohji found himself once again on the ground at Schuldig’s feet.

“So this is how you honor your oath?” Schuldig demanded, eyes flashing with anger. He slid one foot under Yohji and rudely rolled him over. “This is what you call obedience and honoring your duty?”

Yohji pulled himself to his feet and set his jaw, heedless of the blood dripping from a split lip where his face had connected with the stony ground. “No,” he snarled. “This is what I call _freedom_ , something you _took_ from me.”

The Goblin King raised one eyebrow mockingly, his immaculate white almost glowing in the darkness that enveloped the hilltop as the last rays of light faded from the strange, orange sky. “Did I? I seem to remember someone who strongly resembles yourself making me a gift of it.”

It was with a great deal of difficulty that Yohji managed to restrain himself. He wanted more than anything in the world at that moment to lunge forward and wipe the smirk off that arrogant face, but knew full well the futility of any such action. “You stole my life, Schuldig. You stole everything that I was!”

“Are you saying that I gave you nothing in return?” The Goblin King’s anger had returned. “Do you have any idea what you have cost me? Can you even imagine what it is that you have done and are even now in the process of doing?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Yohji snapped, “and I don’t care. I just can’t stand by any longer and watch while you destroy someone else the way you destroyed me!”

“’Destroyed’?” Schuldig’s face was white with the strain of suppressing his reaction. “Is that what you call it?”

“That’s what it looks like from here!” Yohji was nose to nose with Schuldig, glaring directly into those blazing eyes.

“Allow me to disagree,” the Goblin King bit out, and before Yohji could react, he moved forward.

Schuldig wasn’t human. Yohji knew that with the same certainty that he knew that he needed air to breathe. The Goblin King was stronger, faster and thought on several levels at once. His magic was the lifeblood of everything in the Underground, and no one with half a brain ever forgot it. It had been beyond stupid and into the realms of utter insanity to pick a fight with Schuldig.

Yohji, expecting immolation, found himself crashing to the ground, the full weight of the Goblin King bearing him down. He let out a strangled squawk as the air was driven from his lungs and tried to push Schuldig off.

His wrists were seized and pinned securely to the ground, one on either side of his head. Schuldig twisted to bring his knees under him, rising to crouch over his captive. Long hair, the exact shade impossible to determine in the faint light, fell down around his face as the Goblin King leaned in to whisper, “The only one being destroyed here is me.”

Yohji opened his mouth to protest, only to find himself the recipient of an invasive, bruising kiss. A tongue brushed between his lips as Schuldig’s mouth came down on his own, bringing an end to any attempts at speech. Too startled to even struggle, Yohji momentarily froze in place as that same tongue began a determined exploration of his own. His paralysis, however, lasted only long enough for his brain to decide that this wasn’t really a hallucination and to catch up with current events. The blonde heaved recklessly at the hands pinioning his own, achieving nothing beyond the end of the kiss.

“Don’t even _think_ about it,” was the growled command as  
Schuldig relaxed his own position, bringing the full length of his body again into contact with Yohji’s.

Furious, confused and desperately unhappy, Yohji refused to comply. “You can’t do this to -”

“Watch me,” was the snarled response.

Lips met his a second time, and the captive continued to struggle, clamping his jaw firmly shut and wriggling desperately. Schuldig did not appear to be discouraged, however, merely redirection his attentions. A tongue gently traced the split in his lip, following the trail of blood to the edge of Yohji’s jaw.

“What are you do -” Yohji’s protest was cut off as Schuldig swiftly took advantage of the opening and again locking his mouth to that of his prisoner. It was said prisoner’s unhappy conclusion that, as usual, until the Goblin King got what he wanted it was going to be Yohji who would suffer. Angrily, He tilted his head slightly, and moved his lips against Schuldig’s. It took another minute or two before Yohji could force himself to respond more than that, but -

It was an unfortunate side effect of either the Goblin King’s particular brand of magic or his sheer determination, but once again Yohji was forcibly reminded never to take anything for granted. With the weight of the other man against him, his arms pinioned to the ground and a decidedly unwelcome kiss on his lips, Yohji felt something inside himself shatter. He didn’t have the time or attention to spare in order to discover exactly what, but he knew that something had changed.

He came back to himself to find his wrists no longer held captive and his hands tangled deeply in Schuldig’s hair. Their kiss had lost a great deal of both its one-sidedness and its brutality. To his rapidly rising horror, Yohji found himself not only responding fully but taking on a decidedly aggressive approach, despite his position. As he hurriedly pulled his fingers from the back of Schuldig’s neck, the Goblin King ended the kiss and rose smoothly to his feet.

“Defiance. Disobedience. Willful disregard of a direct order.” The familiar voice was again flat with anger. “I warned you, Kudou. Warned you _twice_.”

Yohji dragged himself to his feet, burning with fury and pain. “I don’t care!” he hissed.

“I know.” There was a note in the Goblin King’s voice that Yohji found himself unable to identify. “You knew exactly what you were getting into. Now face your punishment.”

Ran’s eyes blinked as time started again, and Yohji had just enough time to recognize the genuine concern in his expression before the world dropped out from beneath him.


	16. Which Proves to be a Tactical Error

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In Which Yohji Pays the Price for Defiance.

Nagi withdrew his hand and watched solemnly as Aya carefully placed the crystal on the ground and the two children stared at it for a long moment.

“That- that’s horrible,” Aya whispered.

Nagi shook his head. He was only a few years older than Aya, but he had several lifetimes worth of experience to draw on. “It’s worse than you think,” he told her.

“What do you mean?”

“Schuldig gave Yohji what he wanted,” Nagi told her. “But he had to change the Labyrinth to do it. This place,” he gestured at the garden around them, “is a piece of himself. He altered it to make Yohji’s wish come true.”

“So you’re saying that Yohji’s wish changed _everything_?” Aya’s eyes were wide. “Why would he grant a wish like that?”

Nagi shrugged helplessly. “Without knowing exactly what the wish was, I wouldn’t be able to guess. That’s only half of it, though. Yohji made himself a part of the Labyrinth over the years. It sort of has a will of its own and it really likes him.”

“I don’t understand,” her voice was filled with frustration and she kicked at the crystal, sending it rolling across the grass.

“The Goblin King made Yohji forget, and when he finally remembered? He blames Schuldig for what happened and for imprisoning him here. I knew that much. I guess that’s why he’s always so bitter. But he’s still a part of the Labyrinth. None of the rest of us are, really, although Farfarello comes the closest. I think, I think Schuldig saw this coming and Farfarello was an attempt to change things again.” Nagi closed his eyes and flopped back into the grass, brow furrowed. “I don’t think it turned out the way he wanted it to.”

“I still don’t understand,” Aya protested. “If Yohji made the wish?”

“I don’t think that he was thinking very clearly. He never finished verbalizing the wish, anyway. Yohji may not even really know what it was he was wishing for.”

Aya scowled. “But the Goblin King did?”

“That’s why he’s the Goblin King,” Nagi sighed. “But whatever Yohji’s wish was, I don’t think it had anything to do with the Labyrinth. Schuldig has a very weird way of looking at things. His idea of logically granting Yohji’s wish was probably about ninety degrees off from whatever Yohji thought he wanted.”

Aya pulled back against the fountain, her expression fading to one of worry. “So Yohji is angry and Schuldig is angry and, and Ran is lost.”

Sitting up, Nagi turned to the girl and held out his arms. She left the shelter of the fountain and leaned against him, shaking slightly.

“What’s going to happen to Ran?” More softly, her voice shaking now as well, she asked, “What’s going to happen to me?”

**

Crawford burst into the throne room, Farfarello on his heels. It took only moments for the two men to realize that the Goblin King wasn’t anywhere in the vicinity. There was a certain lifelessness to the echoes of their footsteps as they headed toward Schuldig’s favorite window. Even the goblins had deserted the white castle, seeking comfort in the more familiar squalor of the city below.

Farfarello looked out over the messy sprawl of the Goblin City, past the high walls and the junkyard, his eyes seeking out the far distant barrier that marked the edges of their world. The scarred young man folded himself bonelessly against the sill and turned toward his companion. “What are you going to do?”

“If Schuldig’s initial plan works properly, we are going to find ourselves in rather… difficult circumstances,” the older man informed him, frowning slightly. “I think that I can convince the Labyrinth to take an interest in our continued well-being.”

Shaking his head, Farfarello turned to glance over his shoulder at the Labyrinth. He could feel the restlessness of the place beginning to change focus, but it failed to reassure him. “Do you think it will listen to you?”

“Our options at this point are relatively limited. Did you have a better idea?”

Farfarello shook his head again, watching as the landscape spread out before him changed yet again, mirroring the conflict in its depths. It reflected a strange, tearing conflict within Farfarello as well, causing a dull, empty pain he had never felt before. “No. The Labyrinth doesn’t care what I think.”

“I’m simply going to ask it to draw us back here if something should go wrong. That’s simple enough, don’t you think?”

“All of us?” One hand flew out, inscribing an arc that covered the ever-changing expanse of the gigantic maze.

“No. Whatever I ask for will have to have easily defined limits.” Crawford sighed and adjusted his glasses. “Those of us within the castle will do, I think.”

A slight frown appeared on Farfarello’s scarred face. “You’ll have to wait until Schuldig gets back then, and he won’t like this.”

“He doesn’t have to like it,” Crawford told him grimly. “He just has to live with it.”

**

Ran had only a brief moment to register the strange wobble in time, Yohji’s suddenly split lip and angry expression, before he found himself falling. The brief sensation of having the ground yanked out from under him was replaced by discomfort as he impacted heavily on a slanted surface and began to slide. A familiar voice cursed beside him in the sudden darkness, and he realized that, whatever had just happened, Yohji was sliding with him.

The thought gave him a brief surge of comfort. Unfortunately, it lasted only a few moments as the surface beneath him gained a sharper incline and he began to slide faster.

“Oh shiiiiiiiit!!!!”

Skinned elbows, a viciously banged knee, a series of scrapes he could feel all the way through his jeans, and Ran suddenly saw a patch of light rushing toward him. It was coming toward him far, far too quickly. He scrabbled for something to grab, for purchase of any kind, only to find himself defeated by the walls of the tunnel. He gained a ripped fingernail and bruised knuckles for his efforts, but did not succeed in slowing his descent.

‘And we were at the _top_ of the cliff!’

It was something of an anti-climax when something suddenly snagged his collar. True, the pain from being brought up short by sharp pressure against his throat and chin was nothing to be thrilled about and there was a new sharp pain as a result of his full weight being brought up against his own collar, but at least he’d just been saved from plummeting to his death.

“Don’t just hang there,” Yohji snapped. “Try to brace yourself against the sides of the damn tunnel!”

Ran scrambled to obey, or tried to. With a muttered curse, Yohji adjusted his grip on the teen's collar. With a little added leverage, Ran eventually managed to find a position where he could brace himself against the walls of the narrow tunnel.

"What happened?"

"Take a deep breath," Yohji told him grimly.

Somewhat puzzled, Ran obeyed.

**

Ken sat in his chosen tree, staring at the bridge. In the course of the last hour it had gone from being a simple plank to a large, buttressed construction of stone to a simple covered bridge and back again. He’d never seen it change so quickly before.

“Okay, today is obviously not going to be a good day.” Ken bit his lip.

“Try it from my point of view.”

Ken nearly fell from his perch, twisting to stare down at a familiar figure leaning against the tree below him. The Goblin King’s immaculately white attire was simply not suited for the environment, and Ken could count on the fingers of one hand the number of times that Schuldig had visited this section of the Labyrinth.

“Y-your Majesty!”

“None other.” The Goblin King tilted his head slightly so that he could make eye contact with his Guardian. “Hello, Hidaka.”

“Ummm,” Ken fought frantically to think of something to say other than, ‘What the hell are you DOING here?’

“I just stopped by to give you a word of advice,” Schuldig continued, never breaking eye contact. “Kudou will be through here in a little while with some friends. I know what Crawford told you. However.”

The young man in the tree tried not to flinch as those piercing eyes seemed to read every even slightly subversive thought in his head.

“Tread very carefully, Hidaka. This is not one of those times when mistakes will be either tolerated or easily forgiven.”

With a dramatic swirl of his cloak, the Goblin King disappeared. Ken was left staring disbelievingly at the now empty space below him.

“Great. Damned if I do, damned if I don’t.” He slumped back against the bold of the tree, noting absently that the bridge had changed yet again, this time to a set of large stepping-stones. “Of all the bad luck. It _would_ have to be Yohji.”

**

Ran slipped and almost continued his unwilling journey down the tunnel as he fought to keep the meager contents of his stomach. The smell, it crawled down his throat and was attempting to empty his stomach bodily. Yohji’s earlier words came back to him.

‘It’s the nastiest place in the world. Touch the surface, and you’ll smell bad for all eternity. Hell, even your _grave_ will stink. It’s like an open cesspit, and the smell is enough to make you vomit.’

“Just breathe through your mouth,” Yohji advised him, again reaching out to grasp Ran’s collar. “It doesn’t get any better, but it won’t churn your stomach quite so badly then.”

Ran struggled to obey, but it was still several minutes before his stomach stopped heaving. “I’m sorry,” he finally managed to gurgle.

“What, for thinking I was a coward because of a smell?” Yohji’s voice had a bitter twist to it. “I am a coward, make no mistake.”

“I -”

“Just concentrate on getting the hell out of here, all right?”

It took almost twenty minutes for the two of them to carefully make their way down the last few yards of sharply sloped tunnel to the exit. It was night outside, but the light had not truly faded away. Somehow, a dim illumination reminiscent of twilight hung over the bog, supported here and there by the dim flicker of a will o’ the wisp or patch of luminescent growth. The lack of true darkness did not give Ran any reassurance, instead once again pointing up the way that the Underground and the Labyrinth did not obey any of the natural laws of his world.

The tunnel exit left them perched precariously on a very thin ledge above the bog itself. The Bog of Eternal Stench was a vast, bubbling stretch of putrid ooze, broken here and there by what looked to be ruined stone buildings or small hillocks. Ran almost lost control of his stomach a second time, simply from watching the heaving of the oily surface of the bog. The strange slurping and gurgling noises of the geysers did not help his equilibrium either.

Through it all, Yohji stood braced against the tunnel’s mouth, one hand wrapped firmly around a small tree that was growing rather improbably out of the rock. His expression was grim as he scanned the surroundings, a thin smear of blood still visible against his chin.

When Ran finally recovered himself, he glanced almost fearfully at his tall companion. “What do we do now?”

“We find a way out of this disgusting swamp,” Yohji informed him, voice tight with anger.

“What happened up there?” Ran asked, wondering again about the strange hiccough in time just before they began falling.

Yohji laughed, the sound conveying no humor at all. “I fucked us both over, that’s what happened.”

“I don’t understa -” Ran lunged forward as the tree Yohji had been using for purchase suddenly gave way, tipping him over the edge of the ledge. Ran managed to grab hold of Yohji’s arm, but the blonde was too heavy, and they both fell toward the uninviting mess below.

**

Schuldig knew what Crawford’s most likely move would be upon learning of the plans in motion. The Goblin King had years of experience in predicting his oracular Guardian’s fits and starts. However, the sudden surge of magic that surrounded him as he reappeared in his throne room was unexpected. It was unlike Crawford to take the direct approach.

He paused, reaching out with his own magic to discover just what Crawford had coaxed the Labyrinth to do. The answer surprised him. He opened his eyes, turning slightly to observe Farfarello and Crawford leaning in his favorite window, waiting silently for the reaction of their Lord. The two men were a study in contrasts, restrained perfection and wild impulse personified in a pristine business suit and stained black leather. Schuldig had Farfarello for companionship but Crawford was all business, business which Crawford had just moved to an entirely new level.

“That was a rather inspired piece of work,” Schuldig observed, eyebrows slightly raised. “Congratulations, Crawford.”

The two men in the window continued to regard him warily. They had expected anger or even sardonic amusement. This quiet acceptance seemed somehow wrong.

Schuldig threw himself into his low throne, putting his booted feet up over one of the arms. “I wonder if you realize just what you’ve done?” he asked mildly, still without any trace of strong emotion to color his words.

“I assume that you’re going to tell me,” Crawford responded, trading a quick glance with Farfarello.

“You’ve sealed the fate of that little girl, for one thing,” Schuldig told him, producing one of his innumerable crystals and carelessly rolling it between his fingers. “She and Nagi are in the garden at this very moment.”

Farfarello muttered something that could have been a curse, pulling himself out of the window and moving toward the Goblin King. He wasn’t playing in the shadows this time, stalking directly toward Schuldig.

“You knew that this would happen,” Crawford accused, brows furrowing angrily.

“I knew that you would take matters into your own hands,” Schuldig corrected him softly, eyes on Farfarello. “I did not know what the girl’s place in all of this was. In fact, I was rather at a loss as to what was to be done with her. You’ve solved several problems at once, or convinced the Labyrinth to do it for you.”

“And for what?” Farfarello demanded, staring down at his Lord with something like betrayal in his eyes. “What is happening to the Labyrinth, to you?”

“We are changing.” The Goblin King turned his attention to the crystal as it rolled across the back of his hand and up to his elbow.

“’Nothing stays the same forever’,” Crawford murmured, eyes narrowing thoughtfully.

“’Nothing is as it seems’,” Farfarello continued the recitation of the Labyrinth’s catechism, never taking his eyes from Schuldig. “’Take nothing for granted.’”

“’Nothing is fair’,” the Goblin King finished softly, allowing the crystal to roll back to his wrist and around into his palm. With a twist of his hand, he brought the softly glowing orb up between himself and Farfarello. Their eyes met, and something between them, intangible and unseen, changed. “’Nothing is certain.’ Never forget that, Farfarello.”

Farfarello’s eyes widened as the crystal flashed multi-colored light and the world fell away.

Schuldig allowed the crystal to disappear and stared calmly across the empty stretch of room at the remaining guardian. Crawford had taken an involuntary step forward, one hand stretched toward the now-vanished Farfarello and there was shock written across his normally composed features.

“Take nothing for granted,” the Goblin King repeated, still unsmiling. “You may go now, Crawford.”

Shaken, Crawford went.

**

Yohji squeezed his eyes shut as he fell, holding his breath and praying desperately for one last chance at salvation. He was mildly surprised at his own hypocrisy. Years of living within the protective confines of the Labyrinth had conditioned him to accept the various improbable twists of fate and last minute rescues, taking them for granted.

Either the Goblin King’s games were deeper than he had ever imagined, or the Labyrinth was actively working against its master for the first time in recorded history, for instead of the horrible, sucking splash he had been expecting, he landed heavily on a relatively unyielding surface. Ran landed on top of him in his turn, and mildly surprised moans and cursing filled the air.

The two men lay there for a moment or two, trying to catch their breath and wondering just how they had been saved.

“You know,” a familiar voice grumbled, “I’ve been dropped, fallen and knocked over so often since I met you that I’m beginning to doubt that it’s a coincidence.”

Yohji and Ran struggled to their feet, looking down at the rock they had landed on and the object that had cushioned their fall.

“Mamoru?”

**

Crawford stood once again on the cliff overlooking the twists and turns of the Labyrinth, his jaw clenched and eyes tightly closed. Farfarello hadn’t been his friend, but he had been the only person within the Labyrinth who had any influence in regard to the Goblin King. 

Kudou’s influence was unintentional, and did not weigh in any of Crawford’s calculations.

Years of association with the scarred psychopath had not engendered friendship, but a relationship had sprung up between them nonetheless. He did not _like_ the other man. He did not look forward to his meetings with the sly dancer of the shadows. The occasional encounter wherein the Farfarello would appear, hands stained with blood and a small, disturbing smile on his lips, were not the stuff of his fondest dreams.

However, the sudden and almost brutal removal of the other man had left him reeling. Crawford knew to take nothing for granted. He knew that life was never certain. He hadn’t needed the Labyrinth to teach him those lessons. Familiarity had caused him to accept some of the circumstances of the strange life he led here as fact and he should have known better.

Schuldig would never hurt Kudou Yohji. He would never turn on his pet monster. He would never allow himself to lose one of his myriad, dangerous games. He would never, ever deliberately endanger the Labyrinth.

The entire foundation of Crawford’s world had just been shaken, and nothing would ever be the same.


	17. Enter our Knight in Shining Armor

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In Which Ken Displays Perception

Ran helped Mamoru regain his feet as Yohji lit up a rather crumpled cigarette and stared around them. The three of them had ended up in a heap on a small outcropping of rock at the very base of the cliff, fortuitously just large enough to hold them all.

Mamoru and Ran traded stories as Yohji cautiously inched his way along the narrow rock pathway that Mamoru had been following. Mamoru’s story took rather less time to relate than Ran’s and the only real information to be got out of Yohji was a muttered, “Schuldig is going to kill me,” which the teens discarded as mostly unhelpful.

The blonde’s split lip attracted a pair of dubious stares, however, and Ran kept casting worried glances at the older man out of the corner of his eye. Whatever was going on between Yohji and the Goblin King was clearly reaching dangerous levels.

“I still haven’t been told not to help you out,” Mamoru offered, smiling at Ran. “There’ll only be one route out of here anyway, so I’ll come along with you.”

“Whatever,” Yohji growled, discarding his cigarette and reaching for another. He gestured irritably with the hand clutching the lighter. “The bridge should be that way.”

Mamoru and Ran both glanced in the indicated direction, following the narrow rock bridge that skirted the cliff with their eyes. It did not look like it would be an easy trek. However, if the alternative was ending up in the Bog?

“Let’s go.” Ran headed for the edge of their rock peninsula, grabbing Yohji’s wrist in passing and hauling the older man along in his wake. Mamoru trailed slowly behind, noting Yohji’s quiet acceptance of the grip, and the blonde’s almost resigned grimace.

‘Something is terribly wrong,’ Mamoru thought worriedly. ‘If only we had some clue as to what that something was.’

**

Crawford stepped into the clearing that stood before the small structure that Schrient called home. He had never been here in person before, leaving such dealings strictly to Farfarello. The clearing was empty. A swift but careful exploration revealed the building to be equally deserted.

After nearly an hour of searching through the surrounding forest, Crawford was forced to admit defeat. ‘First Farfarello, and now the women….’ He had gone from being slightly unsettled to feeling the unaccustomed stirring of true fear.

‘As events fall into place and decisions are made, he is changing things. Changing us.’ Crawford hastened back toward his own section of the Labyrinth, feeling his heart begin to pound more quickly than could be easily accounted for by his exertion.

‘Who will be next?’

‘What is the ultimate price of all of this going to be?’

**

In the leaden dusk of the garden, Aya finally fell asleep. Too much stress, too much fear and her system had finally chosen unconsciousness as the easy way out. Her head rested on Nagi’s shoulder, and the boy leaned against the fountain, easily supporting her weight. They did not remain so for very long, however.

Nagi watched the Goblin King make his way across the grass. The tall redhead’s stride was sure, although his face was set in grim lines. It was a look that Nagi had never seen on Schuldig’s face, and he fought the almost instinctive urge to shrink back in an attempt to become one with the fountain. The Goblin King sank to his knees in the grass before the children, heedless of the gleaming white of his trousers.

Without a word, Nagi surrendered his sleeping burden and rose to his feet. Schuldig had always been careful in how he handled his youngest Guardian, but even Nagi knew just how dangerous his strange benefactor could be.

“Find yourself someplace to sleep,” the Goblin King directed him, face softening slightly. “I don’t want you going back into the Labyrinth tonight.”

The boy opened his mouth to ask why but hesitated, suddenly thinking of Yohji’s problems and the strange matter of the girl.

Schuldig’s mouth twitched slightly at one corner. “Get some rest. I’ll be needing you before morning.”

With a nod and a last, long look at the little girl curled up in the Goblin King’s arms, Nagi slowly made his way back into the castle. As he disappeared from sight, Schuldig and his small captive also vanished. The garden was strangely still in their wake, no more birdsong to be heard and even the water in the fountain ceasing its trickling laughter.

**

Ran quickly ceded the lead to Yohji when their obvious rock path ended at the edge of one of the hummocks leading further away into the bog.

After only a few minutes, it became clear that a route was appearing almost literally beneath Yohji’s feet. When he wanted to make a turn to the left or right there would be rocks to traverse or a thin strip of dry land almost hidden by swamp grasses. He seemed to know exactly where he was going, although he obviously wasn’t paying a great deal of attention to where he was going. It wasn’t as though the now chain-smoking blond stuck out his foot directly over the muck and solid ground materialized to meet it, but Ran nursed a sneaking suspicion that if Yohji _did_ do something so foolish, his foot would indeed never meet the surface of the Bog.

Mamoru noticed Ran’s fascination with the older Guardian’s somewhat circuitous route and murmured a quiet explanation. “Yohji is the Guardian of the gates and passages. Wherever he needs to go, the Labyrinth itself will make sure that he gets there. It changes around him to meet his needs, whatever they are.” 

“So when you said that if it had been him up in that tree?” Ran’s eyes widened.

A rueful smile greeted his look of astonishment. “The Labyrinth would have brought someone to rescue him, provided the Goblin King hadn’t attended to it himself.”

Ran shot him a doubtful look, still keeping most of his attention on the rapidly moving blond ahead of them.

“The Goblin King can’t be as angry with him as he thinks,” Mamoru argued quietly. “Otherwise we’d still be stuck at the base of the cliff, or worse.”

“I don’t understand any of this,” Ran protested, equally softly.

The other boy shrugged. “As long as we get out of the Bog and find somewhere with food, I’m not going to question our good fortune.”

Ran’s stomach chose that moment to rumble, despite the stench, and he was forced to agree.

**

Ken swung his legs as he stared down at the bridge. The Labyrinth had apparently decided to settle down somewhat and, after an interesting adventure into Mad King Ludwig-esque architecture, had once again produced the thin plank which usually served as the bridge out of the Bog.

The unsteadily balanced board had been constant for almost forty minutes, and Ken knew a set-up when he saw it. Whether the trap in question was meant for him, for Yohji or for the eldest Guardian’s unknown companions, he did not know. His sole interest at the moment was in figuring out the Goblin King’s hidden agenda.

Rule One: Always do as you’re told.  
Rule Two: Never take anything for granted.

Rule one meant that he was to let no one cross the bridge. Free will, within limits, was for Yohji or Crawford or Farfarello. Rule two, however, opened up the range of possibilities that made his skin crawl. If Kudou Yohji really wanted to cross that bridge, there was almost no chance of Ken being able to stop him. On the other hand, a personal visit from the Goblin King warranted closer examination of the facts.

The facts in this case being that Crawford wanted no one to cross that bridge, and that Schuldig had serious issues when it came to Yohji. Chances were good that no matter what he did, poor Ken would end up making the wrong decision. Better to be on Crawford’s shit list than to cross the Goblin King - or end up suspended from some high branch by Yohji’s nasty little wire.

Decision made, Ken relaxed back against the bole of the tree again. “All that’s left now is the waiting.”

**

During the long trek through the Bog, as time slipped irrevocably away, Ran divided his attention between keeping his footing and worrying about his sister. Aya was in the clutches of a sadistic madman and had been, by his watch and what he could guess, for almost seven hours. That left … maybe three hours to reach the castle. Three hours to find their way out of the Bog, travel through the forest, get past the junkyard that Mamoru had spoken of, through the Goblin City and to the castle itself.

“We’re making excellent time,” Mamoru explained softly, catching him staring at his broken watch for perhaps the fifth time in as many minutes. “Yohji will get us there.”

Ran believed it, having witnessed the angry set to Yohji’s jaw and the absolute unwillingness of the older man to engage in conversation. Yohji had run out of cigarettes during the first hour, and his irritability had increased proportionately. His anger, however, was directed almost entirely inward.

Ran had no energy to spare for worrying about his guide, however. His sister’s plight and his own role in it were commanding all of his attention. He knew that he had to reach the center of the Labyrinth. He knew that he had to, somehow, find  
his sister. After that, however, everything was a blank. The simple solution of his favorite story seemed as far away as the moon.

This fantastical place was nothing like the book. He pulled the neck of his shirt up over his face and tried to breathe shallowly, wondering if the author had any real idea of what he had been writing about. Murderous Guardians, psychotic, magic-wielding sadists and the _smell_.

‘I’m sorry Aya. Sorrier than I can ever say. I don’t know what you’ve been going through, but please let it be easier than this.’

Mamoru watched Ran as the other boy followed grimly on Yohji’s heels. ‘Schuldig drew in a child that is too old, and her brother after her. Schuldig hurt Yohji, something I still have trouble believing. Schuldig dropped them both into the Bog. It just doesn’t make any sense, unless….’

“Yohji?”

The blond paused, glancing back at the boys. “What?”

“When did things start getting all… weird?”

Yohji did not pretend to misunderstand. “When I woke up this morning, Crawford and Schuldig were both standing over me. That was the first sign, I think.”

“They sent you to meet Ran?”

The redhead stood between his two new friends, turning from one to the other.

“Yeah. I let him into the Labyrinth.” Yohji leaned against a rock and frowned.

Mamoru echoed the expression. “What happened after that?”

“I stopped by the castle,” he ignored Ran’s indignant squawk, “and found Schuldig with the girl.”

Mamoru waited. From Ran’s description of his sister, the other boy already knew that she was too old to be a goblin and far too young for anything else. It would be interesting to see what Yohji had to say on the topic.

“He was playing cards with the girl,” Yohji went on slowly. “He was losing. He sent me to take the kid back to the beginning again and she said -”

Ran was practically dancing with impatience, but Mamoru clamped down on his arm and he forced himself to remain quiet.

“She said that it wasn’t fair, and that he was mean.” Yohji looked at Mamoru, suddenly uncertain. “Something… doesn’t quite fit.”

“I wish -” Mamoru snapped his jaw shut and thought for a moment. “It would be nice to know if Crawford has seen her.”

Yohji shrugged. “We’d never make it to see him and still get to the castle on time. That’s assuming that he’d feel like cooperating in the first place.”

Both Guardians turned to Ran, who was again checking his broken watch and obviously fighting the urge simply take off running. His little sister had been taken away and he needed desperately to do _something_.

“The sooner we get to the castle, the sooner we can find out what’s really going on,” Mamoru offered.

Yohji nodded, but something in his eyes made Mamoru suddenly doubt the wisdom of bringing him along to confront the Goblin King. Schuldig had done something _to_ Yohji, that much was becoming obvious. Unfortunately, there was again little clue as to what that something had been. If Yohji wanted them to know, he’d say something. Which he obviously had no plans to do.

‘Damn it all.’

**

Schuldig’s return to the castle had brought about yet another mini-invasion of goblins. The throne room was full of the tiny creatures although the lateness of the hour meant that most of them were draped across various surfaces or each other, snoring.

The Goblin King himself was again seated in his favorite window, legs stretched out in the space earlier occupied by Farfarello. Aya was still cradled in his arms, her head pillowed against his once-carefully ruffled cravat. Schuldig was not staring out across the darkened Labyrinth, but down at the child. He played idly with a lock of her hair as he watched her sleep, a very slight smile curving his lips.

His quiet contemplation was interrupted by the arrival of an elderly goblin with long mustaches. Taller than the small forms scattered around the throne room, this goblin wore the armor of the King’s Guard, and a frown upon his dark face.

“Majesty?” The larger goblins were more intelligent than the normal creatures of the city. Instead of being transformed children, they were creatures of Schuldig’s own creation. It was their job to police the castle, and from keeping any real harm  
(Farfarello’s amusements aside) from coming to the smaller goblins.

Schuldig did not bother to look up.

“We are expecting visitors. Kudou, Takatori and a boy. When they reach the city, I want you to separate the Guardians from the boy.”

A pair of bushy eyebrows shot skyward. “’When’?” he echoed disbelievingly. This particular goblin was one of the eldest, and he could only remember two or three occasions wherein someone had actually reached the city on their quest to solve the Labyrinth. Farfarello had been one, but his time had run out before he had actually reached the castle.

“When,” the Goblin King echoed softly, glancing at a familiar, ornate clock as it materialized beside him. “I give them two and a half hours or so. Hinder the boy, but do not stop him.”

“Yes, Majesty.” The elderly goblin paused, staring down at the girl in his master’s lap. “What of the child?”

Schuldig’s smile widened fractionally. “She and I have unfinished business. I will keep her with me.”

“Yes, Majesty.”

**

Ran watched as the minutes fled past and the line of trees he had come to think of as ‘shoreline’ drew slowly closer. He could hardly contain himself when his feet finally hit dry land again, and he sped along in Yohji’s wake as the older man hastened his steps along the edge of the Bog.

There were more of the strange ruins here, crumbled rock structures that Mamoru had assured him were more for ambiance than anything else. Yohji’s longer legs allowed him to draw ahead of his young companions, and he disappeared down the path almost as if Schuldig himself were on his heels.

When Mamoru and Ran finally caught up with the blonde, he was halfway across a rickety board which was precariously positioned above a tongue of the Bog. As his feet hit the other side -

“Hold it right there!”

Someone dropped from the enormous tree that stood beside the ‘bridge’, and with a quick thrust of his foot, sent the plank spinning into the heaving, stinking substance below. He was taller than Mamoru, shorter than Yohji and seemed to fall between the other two in age as well. He had short dark hair, wide, blue-green eyes and his expression was not exactly welcoming.

“What the -?” Ran leaped backward as the new arrival suddenly produced a set of razor sharp, six-inch steel claws.

“Goddamn it, Ken!” Yohji shouted from the other side. “We don’t have time for this!”

“Ken!” Mamoru yelped. “What the hell was that for?!”

“I’m sorry,” Ken told them, his sincerity evident. “But I’ve gotten visits from Crawford _and_ the Goblin King today, and I’m not supposed to let anyone across the bridge.”

“You let Yohji cross,” Ran pointed out, with some desperation.

“Yohji is the Guardian of the paths,” Mamoru reminded him wearily. “Technically, Ken could stop him. In practice, however, the Labyrinth might just build him a second bridge.”

“Can we try that?” Ran asked hopefully, moving away from the stranger until Mamoru was between them.

“What do you mean, you got a visit from Schuldig?” Yohji demanded.

Ken kept his eyes on the boys in front of him. “He was here not a half an hour ago. Made some thinly veiled threats and disappeared again.”

“Why did you have to get rid of the bridge?” Mamoru was demanding, with some irritation.

“So you couldn’t weasel your way around me,” Ken admitted frankly. “Crawford only made me promise not to let anyone cross without permission.”

“Which means that if we’d gotten your permission, or Yohji’s, we probably could have gotten away with it,” Mamoru sighed. “Clever.”

“Yeah, but with the Goblin King deciding to drop by personally?” Ken shrugged, never releasing the sharp claws that protruded from the back of his gloves. “I’m sorry guys, but he really didn’t look happy.”

Ran, slightly horrified fascination with the new arrival’s weaponry aside, was the only one who caught the expression that crossed Yohji’s face at that announcement, and the only one who saw what happened next.

Yohji’s look of anger had faded for an instant, replaced by an almost resigned misery. Before Ran could do more than open his mouth to ask if he was all right, Yohji turned on his heel and fled down the path that led away from the bridge.

“Yohji!”

**

‘This,’ Yohji told himself grimly as he ran down the path, ‘is my fault. If I’d just taken the stupid kid back to the beginning, if I’d just blown him off at the top of the damn cliff, if I’d just given him the fucking peach, none of us would be in this mess.’

He couldn’t really convince himself of the last, however. No one ate one of the Goblin King’s little presents and fully recovered.

Farfarello like to paint with other people’s blood. Mamoru couldn’t remember anything about his past. Schrient…. He grimaced and dropped that train of thought. Nagi, Ken, Crawford and himself were different. Nagi had wished himself here. Ken and Crawford had never tasted Schuldig’s magic because the circumstances which had led to their arrival weren’t particularly traumatic. Yohji had been changed by the magic, it’s true. In his more honest moments he could admit that the change hadn’t been the same as that felt by the others.

But still….

‘Schuldig is after something, and unless and until he gets it, the best thing for the kids is for me to stay as far away from them as possible.’

Unwillingly, his mind went again to the peach. Yohji could possibly buy his way out of his current predicament with Schuldig by giving the thing to the boy. Possibly.

‘I can’t do it. I just _can’t_.’

And so he ran.

**

Ran stared after the vanished Yohji, his heart plummeting. How would they find his way to the castle without him?

Ken found himself pinned to one of the ruined, rocky abutments of the original bridge. Mamoru had both hands curled in the older man’s shirt and was taking absolutely no notice of the deadly weapons that Ken bore.

“Now look. The Goblin King has hurt Yohji twice today. Twice! Whatever is going on here is a little more important than one of our Lord and Master’s games. We _have_ to get to the castle before Ran runs out of time and we _have_ to find out what’s happened to Yohji!”

“I –“ Ken was a little taken aback by the ferocity of the younger Guardian. They’d never met, but the surge of anger and magic was impossible to mistake.

“Now, Hidaka!” the younger boy gritted out. “You get us across that muck, and you do it now! There’s no bridge anymore, so if you want to play word games, you’re not doing anything against orders.”

Sighing, the older boy released his hold on his weapons, and the blades disappeared. “Well, if you put it that way.”

Ran was practically twitching with pent up anger and fear. “Hurry. Please!”

Ken sighed and slid around the tall abutments. “I’ve got a boat. Come on.”

“A boat?” Mamoru blinked. “The muck is only about fifteen feet across.”

“Would you want to risk slipping into it?” Ken asked. “I _never_ use the bridge.”

The two boys hesitated.

“I thought you were in a hurry?”

Three minutes later, they were all on the other side. Ran was out of the boat and up the path before Ken had even begun tying up the small rowboat, Mamoru on his heels. It wasn’t until the third set of pounding footsteps registered, that they turned to find Ken right behind them.

“Yohji is the only friend that I have, and I’m in trouble already,” he told Ran, shrugging at their expressions. “I might as well find out why.”


	18. Goblin King, Telepath, Sadist.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Schuldig indulges in a little more recreational sadism.

Yohji ran, knowing that the Labyrinth would cover his tracks and twist the path so that Mamoru and Ran couldn’t follow him. He didn’t waste much time dwelling on it. They weren’t what he was running from.

Tall trees, lichen covered boulders and the occasional piece of masonry were ignored as he sped past them in the dim, almost dark of the Labyrinth’s night. He didn’t want to see anything familiar, didn’t want to know where he was or where the path was taking him. He wanted, more than anything in the world, simply to run away.

‘We always want the things that we can’t have,’ he told himself savagely. ‘And what would I do if I did manage to escape the Labyrinth? Look at Farfarello. He wandered off once. When we finally got around to telling Schuldig he was gone, it only took him half an hour to get Farfarello back and he’d been gone for over a week!’

The path curved beneath his flying feet and he followed it, never breaking stride.

‘What is wrong with me? Why can’t I just let things be? I’ve been here for….’ Yohji actually had to fight to remember that there’d been a time before he had lived in the Labyrinth and it was a struggle he did not enjoy. ‘I’ve been here for _centuries_ I’ve been acting like an automaton for decades. Why can’t I just let things go back to the way they were?’

A pair of brightly sparkling eyes and a sweet, girlish laugh rose involuntarily in his imagination. He knew why he clung to his anger and why Schuldig’s betrayal had cut him so incredibly deeply. He knew that it wasn’t fair but then, nothing was.

He could feel his lungs beginning to protest the strenuous exercise. Smoking was not something that you did if you planned on taking up long distance running. He’d be coughing too hard to breathe if he kept up this pace for much longer.

Yohji decided that he didn’t care.

**

Nagi had chosen a room not far from the throne room and it was there that the Goblin King found him, curled up in the middle of a luxurious bed, both arms wrapped firmly around a pillow. His eyes snapped open as Schuldig stepped into the room and Nagi sat up, relinquishing his grip on the pillow.

“Watch her for me,” Schuldig told him, carefully setting the little girl on the bed beside him.

Nagi watched as the Goblin King unfastened his cloak and tucked it around the sleeping child. “When will you be back?” he asked quietly.

“Before sunrise.” Schuldig stepped away from the bed and nodded approvingly as Nagi settled himself against the headboard. “If she wakes, keep her inside this room.”

“What’s going on?” Nagi had promised himself that he wouldn’t ask, not wanting to court whatever disaster had befallen Yohji. The words just slipped out of him, however, and he couldn’t help himself.

The Goblin King looked down into the boy’s wide, frightened eyes and smiled gently. “Everything will be all right, Nagi. I promise.”

Schuldig disappeared, leaving the boy again clutching his pillow and wishing for answers. To Nagi, the Labyrinth was a sanctuary in truth. The changing pathways of his small part of the Goblin King’s realm were a home that he’d never hoped to have. Schuldig had never been less than kind to him from the moment he had appeared to the sobbing boy and carried him away.

Nagi wanted to believe that Schuldig would never hurt him, that the Goblin King was telling him the truth. But then, he hadn’t wanted to believe that Schuldig would hurt Yohji, either. While it had been Schuldig who had given Nagi his freedom, it had been Yohji who had stumbled across him that first day alone in the Labyrinth. It had been Yohji who had showed him how to always find his way among the tall hedges that made up his new world. It had been Yohji who coaxed him to make friends with Mamoru -

But it had been Schuldig who had carefully, patiently, taught him how to smile.

Nagi burrowed back among the thick covers of the bed, fighting back a strong desire to cry. His world was coming apart around him, he could feel it. Schuldig was angry and Yohji - Yohji was slowly coming apart at the seams.

Nagi blinked, sitting up again to stare at the opposite wall. That had to be it. Yohji had never exactly been happy for as long as he’d known him. Mamoru had told the youngest Guardian that it hadn’t always been that way and that it had something to do with Schrient and Schuldig. Apparently no one knew any more than that.

But Yohji had been more distracted, more unhappy these past few months. It was as if he were simply going through the motions rather than living. Nagi started trying to remember exactly when things had started to seem off-kilter.

**

When Crawford reached the small courtyard where he spent most of his time, he was unsurprised to find Schuldig waiting for him there. The Goblin King was wearing knee breeches and a ruffled shirt, artfully disheveled and lounging on one of the stone benches. The large torches set here and there along the two stone walls only added to the somewhat melodramatic ambiance.

“It’s my turn, then.”

Schuldig looked up at him from beneath the fiery fringe of his hair. “Are you ready?”

Crawford shrugged, leaning against one of the tall hedges that made up the south wall of the enclosure. “Does it matter? You didn’t ask Farfarello, as I recall.”

The Goblin King rose slowly to his feet, eyebrows arched. “I _made_ Farfarello. I am not in the habit of asking my possessions for their permission when I use them.”

“And Kudou?”

Schuldig shrugged. “Every action has an equal and opposite reaction,” he responded somewhat cryptically.

“Scientific thought from a creature of magic?” Crawford raised his own eyebrows. “There’s something I thought I’d never hear.”

“Are you ready?” the Goblin King repeated, a softly growing crystal appearing in one hand.

Crawford shrugged fatalistically. “As ready as I’ll ever be.”

Moments later, Schuldig was again alone.

**

Yohji’s lungs were screaming now, and his head was throbbing. He kept running, no longer sure if he wanted to stop or what would happen when he just couldn’t run any more.

Matters were taken out of his hands, in the end. Knowing that the path would be clear before him, he was concentrating more on his inner misery than where he was going. He had only a fraction of a second to realize that there was someone else on the path before he cannoned into them at full speed.

They tumbled several yards together in a tangle of arms and legs before ending up in a heap in the shadow of a long-abandoned piece of statuary. As Yohji succumbed to the predicted bout of coughing, his victim attempted to disentangle himself, finally giving it up as a bad job.

Several long minutes later, when Yohji finally managed to catch his breath, a faint light sprang up, allowing him to make out the features of the person he had collided with.

Slightly dazed eyes stared up at him from a pale, thin-featured face surrounded by a great deal of fiery orange hair.

“Oh shit.”

The Goblin King scowled tiredly up at him. “Honestly, Kudou. Don’t you _ever_ look where you’re going?”

**

Ran, meanwhile, was relatively pleased with the amount of progress they were making. Ken was having very little trouble choosing their route. As Mamoru had mentioned earlier, each Guardian had relatively little trouble finding their way through their assigned area. Mamoru had better luck outside his area than any of the others save Farfarello, Yohji and Crawford, none of whom had a particular area assigned to them. However, as long as they were within the confines of Ken’s area, he would have the easiest time choosing a route.

They had come across no trace of the missing Yohji and Ken and Mamoru did not seem surprised at this.

“He was trying to ditch us,” Mamoru exclaimed with no little disgust. “He probably thought that he was doing us a favor, damn it all.”

“He’s like that,” Ken’s voice drifted back to them from around a particularly large bush. “Takes too much on himself, if you ask me.”

The teenagers hurried to catch up only to find their current guide staring at a fork in the trail with an expression of extreme disapproval.

“Which way?” Ran asked.

“I don’t know,” was the candid answer. “There shouldn’t be a fork here at all.”

Mamoru moved forward and took several steps down the path to the left. “I think this one leads to the junkyard.”

Ken mirrored his movements, starting down the right hand way. “This one as well. Probably a delaying tactic. One will end up being much longer than the other.”

“Which way should we take, then?” Ran asked, glancing again at his broken watch and feeling his frustration grow.

“The right, I think,” Mamoru decided, moving to join Ken. “Left seems to curve back toward the Bog.”

“Okay. To the right it is.”

**

After several false starts, Schuldig and Yohji managed to untangle themselves. The light had sprung from one of Schuldig’s myriad crystals, which remained hovering above them as they got to their feet.

“What are you doing here, Yohji?” Schuldig asked him finally, brushing at the dirt on his trousers. “What have you done with the boy?”

“I left him with Mamoru and Ken at the bridge,” Yohji responded dully. He stared down at his feet, wishing that he had ended up anywhere but here.

“I take it you still have my present?” It wasn’t really a question.

Yohji nodded, wretchedly, as the Goblin King produced a second crystal and stared into it for a moment or two.

“No real harm done,” Schuldig decided aloud. He turned the crystal in his palm, glancing over at the blonde. “Yohji, where were you going in such a hurry?”

It was the tone of voice that did Yohji in. Warm, interested, familiar; as if the last fifty years had never happened, as if the past few hours had been a hallucination. “Away,” he whispered, just loudly enough for Schuldig to hear his voice catch on the word. “Just… away.”

“Running away never helps. You know that.”

Familiar voice, familiar arms and a note Yohji couldn’t even begin to identify. Without another thought for past anguish or possible consequences, Yohji leaned into the embrace. Fighting back tears, he asked, “Why can’t it just end? Why won’t you let me go?”

“Because I can’t. Because you don’t really want to go.” Schuldig leaned his cheek against Yohji’s hair. “If you really want to leave, I won’t stop you.”

There was a moment of frozen silence as Yohji digested this unexpected offer. “’Nothing is as it seems’,” he quoted bitterly. “What do you want from me, Schuldig?”

“A great many things I can never have,” the Goblin King responded, his own voice harsh. “But I’ll trade you your freedom for one last service.”

Yohji pushed him away, face twisted with anger. “I can’t do it, Schuldig. Try to understand that. I. Just. Can’t.”

The Goblin King arched an eyebrow, expression giving nothing away. “It’s just a peach, Yohji. All I’m asking is for you to give it to him. That’s all I want. Give me this one thing, and I’ll let you go.”

Yohji searched the familiar face, but could find nothing to hint at what Schuldig was really after. “Why? Why me?”

“Why not?”

From warmth to ice, from caring to cruelty. Yohji felt again as though he’d been dropped from a very great height. He moved away from Schuldig, again avoiding those piercing eyes, and leaned against the age-worn sculpture that towered above them both. 

“If I do this one thing, you’ll let me go?”

“If you do this one, small thing, I’ll give you your freedom.” The Goblin King moved forward, fingers skimming his oldest companion’s chin and turning that unhappy face until their eyes met. “This is the last thing that I’ll ask of you, Yohji. Will you do this for me?”

Caring again, and Yohji found that he couldn’t summon up any feeling in response other than a certain tired resignation.

“I’ll do it,” he whispered, eyes sliding closed against the sudden screaming of his conscience.

Warm lips pressed against his for a brief, heart-stopping moment, but when Yohji’s eyes flew open in shocked surprise, Schuldig was gone and darkness once again enveloped the area around the tall statue. He stared at the space which had been occupied only a moment before by the manipulative Lord of the Labyrinth.

“What the fuck have I gotten myself into now?”

**

Two hours and forty-five minutes left to go (give or take), and Ken stumbled into a small clearing, Mamoru and Ran hot on his heels.

“Yohji?”

Yohji whirled, shock written across his face. “Ken?”

Mamoru was across the clearing in moments, both arms thrown around the tall Guardian. “Yohji! We were worried about you! Are you all right?”

Ran followed his impetuous friend more slowly, uncertain as to his reception. “You’re not going to leave us again, are you?”

Ken waited by the edge of the clearing, looking around suspiciously. “This isn’t supposed to be here,” he muttered, casting a dubious glance at the lichen-covered statue. “I’ve never seen this place before.”

“I’m fine,” Yohji assured them, dredging up an unconvincing smile. “I - I’m sorry.”

Ran looked again at his watch and then cast an imploring look at Yohji. “We’ve gotten a bit turned around. Which way should we go?”

With a shrug, Yohji pointed to the left. “That way. You’re almost to the edge of the junkyard already.”

Mamoru glanced at Ken, who frowned. “We’ve made incredibly good time, then. It usually takes me another half an hour or so to get there from the bridge.”

“Who cares? Come on!” Seizing Yohji’s wrist, Ran started in the indicated direction. As they disappeared into the trees, Ken put out an arm, stopping Mamoru from following.

“Something’s wrong, even worse than before. Keep your eyes open.”

Mamoru could only nod.

**

The Goblin King walked the streets of the deserted city, between the crooked buildings and past the dry fountain. He still had dirt and a smear of grass on his trousers, not that he was thinking of that. 

No sound disturbed him as he walked; his own footfalls the only audible sign of life. He moved through the streets, up the uneven steps that curved to the castle, alone for the first time in millennia.

He was discovering that he did not enjoy it.

There were no birds singing in the Labyrinth now, no soft scuttling sounds inside the walls and in the dry leaves beneath the trees. No whispering voices or muttered warnings – the Labyrinth was silent and empty in way it had not been for – for a very, very long time.

He enjoyed that even less. 

The Labyrinth had ceased its changing and shifting, settling even as Schuldig had removed the life from within it. The path to the castle would stay stable, the gates and doors open.

Not that Schuldig expected any of them to make it this far.

There were six souls left in the Labyrinth, soon to be four, then two – and he’d wait for them here, where they’d be easily able to find him. He couldn’t leave them here, after all.

The Goblin King didn’t have to walk up the long stairs, through the tall doors, left carelessly open. He didn’t have to step over the carelessly discarded toys - Schuldig did a lot of things that he didn’t ‘have’ to. It was one of the things that made it easier to mistake him for human.

“Nagi. Nagi, wake up.”

Nagi slept lightly at the best of times, and the current unsettled state of the Labyrinth hadn’t helped him to rest. His eyes opened immediately, and he blinked up at Schuldig.

“Come along. Time to get up.” 

“Get up?” Nagi blinked. “It’s not morning?”

“No.” Schuldig glanced past him to Aya, sprawled out in the boneless sleep of the young. “I’m about to break a promise, and I have things to tell you.”


End file.
